


You Might Think I'm Crazy

by Minim Calibre (minim_calibre)



Category: What's Your Number? (2011)
Genre: Actually Ever After, Bad Relationship Habits, Canon-Typical Sexual Content, Canonical Terms For Genitalia, Established Relationship, F/M, Family Dynamics, Holidays, Love, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-17
Updated: 2016-12-20
Packaged: 2018-09-09 06:40:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 32,365
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8879863
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/minim_calibre/pseuds/Minim%20Calibre
Summary: "Love does not consist of gazing at each other, but in looking outward together in the same direction."- Antoine de Saint-Exupéry"Any way you want it/That's the way you need it"- Journey





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [gwyneth](https://archiveofourown.org/users/gwyneth/gifts).



> Thanks to the usual suspects for the hand-holding, the interventions, and for listening to me explain everything in such tedious detail and with such alarming frequency. And thanks to gwyneth, whose prompts made this assignment a delight.

Somewhere in the background, people are cheering and toasting while a gaggle of kids swear like tiny, tuxedo-clad sailors and all Ally can do in between kissing him is stare up at Colin with a stupid grin on her face.

"You know," he says, "I'm going to have to get back on stage after they're done with the toasts." Then he's kissing her again, soft and slow.

Holy shit. She actually did it. This is really happening.

"In that case," she replies, "got any plans after the wedding?"

He runs a finger across her collarbone. "Getting you out of that dress."

"Yeah? And after that?"

"Well, after some hopefully mind-blowing sex, I was thinking we could burn it," he says, and gives her a cheeky grin, the kind she's realizing now just how much she'd missed. "Even by the low standards of bridesmaid dresses, it's a monstrosity."

"Mom picked them out. It used to be worse but I tore off the ruffle and bow on my way here. I would have torn off more, but it's all I've got on and I really didn't have time to get arrested for streaking." She pauses. She did a lot of things on her way here. Some of which could still get her arrested. "I also may have stolen a car. Holy shit, I stole a car. And then I told some pizza delivery guy he could take it when I stole his bike."

"Oh, Ally." Colin bursts out laughing, loudly enough that a few well-dressed heads turn their way. She really likes his laugh. "Ally, Ally, Ally. Wow. I love you. Okay, new plan: we find the car before I have to borrow bail money from my bass player and then we get you out of that dress."

"Sounds great." She's still grinning and he's still laughing. That's probably a good sign.

"Don't worry about it. I can make a few calls and find out where it is now. You'll probably have to pay the impound fee and come up with one hell of a good story, though. Whose car did you steal, anyway?"

"No clue. It was the first set of keys I grabbed and I just kind of went for it."

"Do you even know what type of car it is? That'd really come in handy."

"A blue one?"

"Blue car. I think we're going to need a little more to go on."

"Small? Had one of those evil eye things hanging from the rearview mirror? It was either a Honda or a Hyundai. Or maybe it was a Toyota. Oh! I'm pretty sure it was a hatchback."

~

It is a Honda and she does have to pay the impound fee, but it turns out that the car is Sheila's so at least Colin doesn't have to post bail. Ally does promise to buy her a bottle of tequila. It's the least she can do.

~

"I risked jail for you," she says when they finally get back to their building. She's somewhere between giddy and punchy. And still winded. Really winded. She drove, biked, and ran through every corner of Boston and she still has to make it up the remaining four flights of stairs.

"Well, I hope I'm worth it."

"Good thing you've got the rest of the night to prove it."

It's also a good thing when, two flights later, he hoists her up on the landing just outside 4d, easing her legs around his hips as he kisses her. Behind the door, she can hear Bandit whining. 

"Hang on tight." Colin kisses her again. Ally obediently wraps her arms around his neck and crosses her ankles over his butt, trying to keep her high heels from digging into it. "You look like you're about to collapse and you've still got that dress on."

"I don't suppose you're the one who put the out of order sign on the elevator because too many people were using it?" Ally asks. She can hope.

"Sadly, no. It really is broken. And I swear it's not actually my fault."

~

Colin sets her down as soon as they make it to the top of the stairs. "Your place or mine?" he asks. He's sounding a little winded now too, but that's not enough to stop him from kissing her before she can answer.

When they finally come up for air, she says, "Your choice."

"Then how about yours? I haven't changed my sheets in a while and I've got some ideas about what we could do with your headboard."

That sounds amazing but—"Shit! My keys are at Mom's."

"That's okay." Colin pulls his keys out of his jacket pocket. "You never asked me for my copy back and I never took it off my key chain."

"I can't decide if that's cute or creepy."

He grins at her and unlocks her door, admitting,  "To be honest, it's probably about nine parts me being lazy."

~

They kiss their way to the bedroom, stumbling over each other's feet until they hit the edge of her bed. Colin has one hand under her hiked-up skirt and the other one on her back, going for her zipper.

"Wow, you weren't lying. That dress really is all you have on." The hand under her skirt has made its way to her butt.

"And the heels." Ally kicks them off. "And now it's just the dress. I think you said something about getting me out of it?"

His fingertips are ticklish against her back. They're rough with guitar calluses and damn, she really wants to feel them on her nipples.  "Sadly, your zipper's stuck."

"You could just rip it open."

"Or…we could leave it on and I could debauch you while you're still in it."

"Only if you leave on the tie."

He laughs against her neck. "Just the tie?"

"All of it, buddy. I've already seen you naked."

"It's really cold in the Harbor. I wasn't at my best, so don't hold that against me."

Ally unzips his pants and palms his erection through his boxers. "You're right. Your penis is much more impressive now. How about you hold it against me?"

"How about I hold it in you?"

"You better do more than just hold it; the condoms are in the top right drawer."

"Good, because I've stopped carrying them on me. Though I guess now I've got a good reason to start up again."

"They're under my vibrator." The one that works, not the one she needs to throw out. They're on top of that one. She burned it out going slow with Jake Adams.

Her skirt ends up bunched around her waist, a trapped edge of torn tulle at the back scratching her butt with every thrust. Somehow, that doesn't take anything away from the experience.

When they're done, he rolls off her and they lie there panting and laughing. He's still got his shoes on.

"Next time," Colin says, turning his head to look at her, "we're doing this naked. I can't afford too many dry cleaning bills. So, did I make it into the top ten?"

Ally rolls over and rests her chin on his chest. One of his shirt buttons is digging into her chin, but at least the tulle's no longer digging into her butt. "You're definitely in the top twenty. Maybe even the top ten." Honestly, he's in the top five. Easy.

"Guess I'll just have to make my way up the charts."

She grins at him and starts undoing his tie. "I guess you will. Now get me out of this dress."

~

The dress is even more of a wreck by the end of the night. Colin's right that they should probably burn it. Instead, she shoves it into the back of her closet after he falls asleep. She'll keep it for the sentimental value. Maybe she can learn how to quilt.

~

"Hey, so I thought you said you weren't that kind of band," she says the next morning. They've been awake for about an hour and still haven't made it out of the bed for anything longer than a bathroom break.

"We're not. Well, that band's not. Last night's band is that kind of a band."

"You have different bands?"

"I have the cover band that pays the bills and the actual band that plays the rooftop. They have the same bass player, though." Colin kisses her shoulder. "I keep trying to quit the first one, but it pays the rent."

"What does your real band sound like?"

"Nothing like Dropkick Murphys, no matter what my sister claims. Why don't you come up to the rooftop tomorrow night and find out? Tonight's another big wedding, and, having seen their requests, Richie and I will definitely need something to cleanse our musical palates."

"Maybe. Are you sure you want me there?"

"Absolutely. Just don't forget you promised him a bottle of rum in exchange for driving us around last night."

"Shit."

"Don't worry, Richie has crappy taste. He'll be happy with a bottle of Malibu. In fact, you can regift him the bottle he gave me for Christmas last year. My tastes may be cheap, but even I draw the line at drinking alcoholic sunscreen."

Her response to that is pure, stupid reflex. Because honestly, she likes Malibu Rum, especially with pineapple juice. But even though there's no reason to, even though she's pretty sure Colin would just make a grossed-out face and wonder how someone could hate mustard and like coconut rum, something inside Ally still makes her say, "Gross, right? But the 'shit' was for tomorrow night. I can't make it. Jamie arranged a post-wedding girl's night out for the bridal party."

"Well, we practice up there a lot, so you can just catch us next time. This is nice," he says. He smiles at her and runs a hand up her leg. Damn, his eyelashes are so long it's not fair. "Just staying in bed with you. We should stay in bed all day. I think that sounds awesome."

"Awesome as that sounds, don't you think we should probably get something to eat soon?" 

"I could eat you, does that count?"

"Tempting, but I was thinking more along the lines of bacon and eggs. My stomach is about five minutes away from staging a revolt and eating itself in protest."

"Do you have bacon and eggs?"

"No, but I do have cereal. Shit. But no milk. Leftover pizza? It's probably still good."

"How's this sound: I grab the milk from my apartment, we each have a bowl of cereal, and then we go back to bed?"

"Kinda like a plan." She's grinning again. She can't help it.

She's just so ridiculously, stupidly, improbably happy right now that not even the inevitable prospect of dealing with her mom is making a dent in it. She'll have to, even assuming Daisy didn't spill the beans about exactly why she ran off in the first place. Just not yet.

 

~*~

 

The first time Colin meets Ally's mother, he and Ally have been together for a little less than two weeks and Colin hasn't slept in his own bed since day three. Ally is out, off having lunch with her dad. Colin's messing around with the wiring for her sculptures again—he thinks he's figured out where he went wrong last time—when someone starts pounding on the door knocker in a way he can only describe as strident.

Naturally, as Daisy's still on her honeymoon, he assumes it's Ally.

"You forget your keys again?" he says as he opens the door. To someone decidedly not Ally.  Someone clearly related to Ally, though, and, if he had to make a bet, he'd put his money on it being her mother. From her hair and the way she's dressed, Ally's obsession with tracking down Jake Adams suddenly makes a lot more sense. He's not sure what he pictured her mother looking like, but it sure as hell wasn't like this.

The woman raises her carefully sculpted eyebrows and looks him up and down with apparent disbelief. Colin's wearing a pair of novelty boxer shorts because he keeps forgetting to do laundry, his hair is a mess, and he's pretty sure Ally left a few hickeys on his neck when they woke up this morning as revenge for using her toothbrush last night.

She purses her lips, sighs, and pulls her cellphone out of her purse. There's no doubt in his mind who she's calling.

"Ally," she says. Her voice says money every bit as much as her hair and clothing. Maybe more. "Are you aware there's a strange man in your apartment."

He can hear Ally on the other end. "Ask him to check the couch cushions for my keys."

"I knew she'd forget them," he mutters. He finds them wedged between the arm and the seat, right where she put her purse the night before.

"He appears to have found them," Ally's probably-mother says in a voice cold enough to make his balls shrink up in self-defense.

"Mom, be nice to Colin. I'll be home in about fifteen."

Which means she'll be home in half an hour at the earliest.

As her—confirmed—mom slides her phone back into her purse, he smiles so as not to show fear and asks, "Hi, Ally's Mom. Would you like a cup of coffee?"

She sits down gracefully in a chair, legs crossed at the ankles. "So how do you know Ally? I'm surprised she didn't mention to me that she was seeing anyone."

He has no idea how to answer that.

 ~

Once Ally's home, Colin kisses her hello and goodbye and uses his overdue laundry as his excuse to leave her with her mother. Who didn't know about him. Who was surprised that she didn't know about him, which makes two of them.

Ally didn't tell her mom about him and he's surprisingly not okay with that.

Really, really not okay with that. So not okay with that, in fact, that this stings almost as much as when she'd rejected him and, he'll admit, for reasons one-hundred percent related to how and why she'd rejected him. He doesn't do his laundry. He just sits on his bed staring blankly at the wall and wondering what to do next. He's pretty sure he's been someone's dirty little secret before. No, he's absolutely sure and he'd actually liked it. It's a hell of a lot different if that's the last thing you want to be.

The knock on his door is frantic, not strident. It's so obvious that it's Ally that, just for a minute, he considers not answering so he doesn't have to talk until he's feeling a little less like this will turn into a fight that there's no way to actually win.

Because it's Ally, he answers it anyway. He's so completely and totally screwed.

"I didn't know she was coming," she says, standing awkwardly in his doorway with a guilty look on her face.

"Or else you'd have told her about me?" This is not going to be the kind of conversation they should be having in the hallway. No way he's the only nosy neighbor in the building. He steers her in by the arms and shuts the door behind them. "You ran out of your sister's reception to find me. What the hell did she think you were doing?"

"I don't know. She'd had a lot of champagne and then Daisy told her about the baby and, honestly, I haven't talked to her for more than five minutes since then, so I haven't had a chance to tell her about us specifically. Usually, when she calls, I just say my cell signal's cutting out and hang up while she's in the middle of lecturing me. Clearly, she knew something was up or else she wouldn't have ambushed me."

"Really?" It comes out flatter than he'd intended.

She blows an out of place strand of hair somehow even further out of place. "Yeah. Sorry. No one should have to meet Mom unprepared." Then she frowns a little. It's cute the way it makes her nose wrinkle. So, so screwed. "Come to think of it, that's probably why I've avoided having her meet my boyfriends if I could help it."

"She seemed surprised you hadn't said anything." He watches her carefully to see how she responds.

"Well, that's Mom for you." It's just a little too perky, the same kind of perky that tends to mean she's not being totally honest. She just hasn't used it on him before.

"What did she want anyway?"

"Beats me. I think she just wanted to stand around and disapprove of my choices in person."

Because he can't, apparently, leave well enough alone, he answers, "Like me. That is, like me if she'd known about me. Specifically."

"More like my lack of a job, like me dumping Jake, like my hair. That's just what she does."

"Right."

She throws up her hands and goes and sits down on his couch. "Okay, fine. Maybe I was being an asshole again. I hadn't specifically told her about us and I'm sorry. I just didn't want her being Mom about something as important to me as you are, okay? I wanted to enjoy it for a while without having to listen to her criticizing me. If it helps, I told Dad today. It's why we had lunch."

Colin looks at her face, honest and remorseful and, god help him, adorable, and gives up. He sits down next to her and slings an arm around her shoulders.  "You're not really an asshole, Ally."

"I am, but it's not you, it's me. I lived with Donald for six months and not only did no one ever meet him, I didn't even tell Daisy about him until he dumped me. I told Donald my parents were in Europe and my sister was doing a semester abroad when she'd already graduated and was living about a mile away from our apartment and Mom still doesn't know he exists unless Daisy told her and didn't tell me."

"You never told me that." And yet, it actually makes perfect sense in an Ally sort of way. In fact, it's kind of a relief. 

"Well, now you know." She frowns, her nose wrinkling again. "Wait. Does this mean you've already told your parents about me?"

"I may have told Dad when we were trying to find the car you stole so I could convince him pull a few strings with his buddies and, even though they've been divorced since I was twelve, my mom called me the next day to grill me. I think she's already making a list of names to suggest for our hypothetical future children."

A smile teases at the corners of her mouth. "That seems kinda premature of her."

"To be fair, I'm pretty sure everyone in my family thought I was a lost cause. Also, Mom really loves grandkids and was sure she wouldn't get any more of them after the last one. She'd love to meet you, by the way. When she comes back from Florida, that is."

"How long is she there for?"

"Usually until right before Thanksgiving. She moved to Miami with her girlfriend a couple of years ago. Says the cold winters are too hard on her knees. And you've already met my nephew. Well, one of my nephews."

"How many do you have?"

"Four. And one niece. But that's it for now at least. Though Katie said she was done after she had Jody and then had Jacob a few years later, so despite what Mom thinks, I feel like it's a number that's subject to change."

Her eyes go wide. That's cute, too. She kind of reminds him of a muppet and he probably shouldn't tell her that. "Wow," she says.

"Don't worry, I only want two, tops. Being outnumbered is a horrible thing. I should know, I was the youngest of three."

~

The second time he meets her mother, two days later, at least he's wearing a shirt and he's not by himself in the apartment.

"I felt I should meet your young man properly," she tells Ally.

"Mom, this is Colin. Colin, this is Mom." Ally's wearing a shirt. It's his, it's inside out, and she spilled strawberry margarita all over it the night before, but it's more than she was wearing when her mom called from outside the front door.

Her mom wrinkles her nose the same way Ally does, only on her, it looks like she's just smelled something unpleasant. "Call me Ava, please."

"Hi, Ava. Pleased to meet you." After a moment, he thrusts out his hand.

Despite her claim of, "Likewise," the feeling does not appear to be mutual. The furtive glances at Ally make that clear.

Or maybe they're not about him at all, because Ava picks up a strand of Ally's hair and frowns. "Oh, Ally. Tell me you're not still going to the same hairdresser."

"I'm still going to the same hairdresser. I've been going to the same hairdresser for the last five years."

"The one who convinced you that bangs were a good idea?"

"The bangs were my idea, Mom. Nigel had nothing to do with it. He tried to talk me out of them, even."

Time for a save. "Hey, Ally, don't you have that meeting this morning?"

"Oh, yeah. That meeting. Yes. Absolutely."

"And what meeting might that be?" Ava asks, eyebrows raised.

"About setting up her sculpture business."

The brows go up another notch. "You're setting up a business, Ally?"

"Yep. Gonna sell my freaky little sculptures."

"That's hardly a career. What about the position Bob Ambrose told me about?"

"Mom, the position Bob Ambrose told you about isn't a position I'm qualified for, even if I wanted to work in marketing again. Which I don't. Anyhow, Colin's right. Great to see you, Mom, but I've gotta go get dressed and go."

"I suppose Colin and I will just have to get to know each other without you," Ava replies. "I'll make lunch reservations. He doesn't look like he's busy."

Shit.

The save goes to Ally this time. "Mom, that's so great of you! But Colin's coming along, too. Aren't you, Colin?"

"I am."

"Yeah, he introduced me to my business consultant, so"—Ally gives her mom a wide, apologetic smile that's fake enough Stevie Wonder could see through it—"he has to be there. Hey, aren't you supposed to be picking Daisy and Eddie up from the airport today, anyway?"

"Another time then, I suppose." Ava looks at him, sharp-eyed, and smiles as falsely as Ally. "I want to know everything there is to know about the man Allyson gave up Jake Adams to date."

"Wow," Ally says, "that'll be great. We'll let you know when we're free. Bye, Mom!"

After she leaves, Colin exhales loudly and eyes the bottle of tequila that's still on the kitchen counter. "Okay. I'm beginning to see why you don't tell her about the people you're seeing."

"I didn't even tell her about Jake. She found out when she saw a picture of us in a magazine."

That's impressive. No wonder Ally assured him he didn't need to take it personally.

 

~*~

 

Thanks mostly to Daisy and her rapidly expanding belly, Ally manages to stave off a maternal assault for three full weeks after the initial ambushes. She's just starting to think she'll be able to avoid it until after Daisy gives birth when Mom calls her and she's dumb enough to pick up the phone. Ally's making noises she thinks are appropriate responses to whatever Mom's saying, only half-listening while she's busy putting the finishing touches on her first real custom sale, so it takes her a while before the reason for the call finally registers.

"Mom, I don't want to housesit for you for the week, and anyhow, don't you have someone you hire for that?"

"Oh, Ally, you know I haven't been able to trust a housesitter since I went to Paris and half my plants died." The dramatic sigh that goes along with it triggers a reflexive eye-roll.

"It was one plant, Mom, and it was already half-dead before you left." Which was actually Ally's fault; she accidentally dumped a glass of wine in it.

"I would have asked Daisy, but she's a newlywed with a job and a baby on the way. You, Ally, don't have anything you need to do."

She really shouldn't have told her mom she was a jobless whore. Not if she didn't want it to come back to haunt her. "I have a new business to run and a new boyfriend I like to spend time with."

"You can bring Calum if it will convince you."

"Colin. You have a mind like a steel trap, so stop pretending you don't know his name." Ally switches the phone to her other ear and represses a sigh. "Fine. I'll think about it."

"I'll put together my itinerary and a list of all the things that you'll need to look after while you're at the house. We can go over it before I leave. Why don't I have you and Colin over for dinner so we can discuss it?"

"I said I'd think about it."

"Thursday at six, Ally." Then she hangs up, leaving Ally to stare in consternation at her phone.

"I'm not ready for this," she mutters.

She texts Colin _Pls tell me you have plans Thurs._

_No plans._

_Can you invent some?_

_What's up?_

_My mom._

The phone starts ringing a second later. "What about your mom?" Colin asks before she even gets out a hello.

"She wants us to have dinner with her. And she wants me to housesit for a week while she's in London."

"What's she doing in London?"

"Shopping, going to the theatre, probably resting up to find more ways to disapprove of me when she gets back. I know she loves me, but with her, it's a blood sport."

"Might as well rip off the band-aid, Ally. At least if we know when we're facing her, we'll have time to put clothes on."

"She wants us to have dinner at her house."

"Ouch, home field advantage."

"How long until you're back from wherever it is you are?" She'd idly kissed him goodbye when he left that morning but forgot to ask him where he was going.

"Band meeting, and I'm about a block away. I picked up sandwiches."

 ~

A few minutes later, she's opening the door and taking the sandwich Colin hands her.

"Thanks," she says from around a mouthful of pastrami on rye. "I forgot to eat lunch."

He heads to the fridge and pulls them each out a bottle of beer. "You always forget to eat lunch when you're working. That's why I got us sandwiches."

"God, you're amazing. This sandwich is amazing."

"As amazing as me?"

Ally takes another bite. "Pretty close." Then she says, "Mom wants us there at six o'clock."

Colin takes a sip of his beer and asks, "What's more likely to throw her off her game: early or late?"

"Either, but early's less likely to make her start in on the disappointment before the first plate. She'll still be distracted by cooking and setting the table."

"What's the dress code?"

"For meeting my mom?"

"For not _not_ impressing your mom."

She thinks about it seriously for a minute. "Dress shirt and slacks, maybe a nice jacket. But no tie."

"Right," he says. "Obviously, a tie would be trying too hard."

"It would. She's already seen you in your natural habitat."

"I was kidding."

"I'm not. Trust me," she says glumly. "I've known her my whole life."

 

~*~

 

On the way to her mom's, Colin swears he can feel Ally growing tenser with each click on the cab's meter. By the time they get there, she's practically vibrating. It doesn't help that they were late getting to the train and it's already 6:13 by the time they pull into the gravel driveway.

Ava's house is imposingly huge from the outside. Maybe it's not so bad inside, although somehow, he doubts that.

He's right to do so. It's actually worse.

"Wow, you grew up here?" The living room looks like it came straight out of a magazine shoot. It's also enormous. About three times the size of the place he grew up. Maybe four.

"From kindergarten to college," Ally says. She's looking around furtively, kind of like she expects her mom to pop out at any moment.

Good call. Ava glides into the room, also looking straight out of a magazine shoot.

"Ally, there you are. And Colin." The smile is as ball-shrivelingly terrifying as he remembers. "Welcome to my home."

Ally's return smile is huge and overly apologetic. "Sorry we're late, Mom, but you know how trains are."

~

The dining room is pure _Martha Stewart Living_ as well, or it would be if there were more than just three place settings at the absurdly long table. Each one has some impressive napkin origami going on to make up for it. Ava sits at the head, leaving Colin and Ally to sit across from each other. He's suddenly glad Grandma Shea insisted on drilling him on which utensils to use.

"Ally hasn't told me what it is that you do, Colin," Ava says, passing him a serving dish containing something green. Dutifully, he scoops some on to his plate and passes it along to Ally.

"I'm a musician."

"Another musician!" The way she manages to combine fake enthusiasm with a note of Ally-directed pity is impressive. "What sort?"

"I play guitar and I sing."

"And where do you play?"

"Weddings, mostly. Also bar mitzvahs, bat mitzvahs, birthday parties, anything where you need a band. We played at a wake once. That was fun." Well, not really, but apparently, the request was in the will and the bereaved had paid them through the nose. Compared to this, though, it had been a blast.

"He's really good," Ally says. "You should hear him play sometime."

Her mom makes a noncommittal humming sound around a tight smile. "College?"

"I studied music at UMass Lowell." He sensibly doesn't mention that he dropped out three years into it and is still paying off his student loans.

"What about your family? What do your parents do?"

It feels like he's stuck in a job interview. No, more like he's been taken in for questioning. "They're both retired. Dad was a cop, Mom was a teacher, then a housewife, then she was a teacher again after the divorce."

Colin cuts off a bite of bland, slightly dry chicken breast—Martha Stewart would not approve—and gamely chews at it before washing it down with what's most likely a really good white wine, not that he can actually tell. He'll drink it, but despite his sister's best efforts to change it, he'd rather just have a beer.

"Hey, how did the wedding pictures turn out, Mom?" Ally says, clearly trying to change the subject. "Daisy said the proofs came back."

It works. "Oh, they look lovely," her mom replies, "Didn't Daisy email you them?"

"Nope, not yet," says Ally, when the truth is, not only has Daisy emailed them to her, Ally's shown them to him so he could see the full horror of the bridesmaid dresses. "Why don't you tell me about your favorites?"

~

"Would anyone like more _petits pois à la Française_?" Ava asks, serving herself another small spoonful of the something green he's been pushing around his plate and that Ally's hidden under her chicken. So that's what they're supposed to be. It's the first time he's heard her sound uncertain about anything; it makes her seem almost human.

"Ooh, gosh, you know, dinner's really great, Mom, and these peas are amazing, but we had a huge lunch. Why don't we just take some leftovers?"

"Well, please tell me you've at least left room for coffee and dessert. I ordered chocolate eclairs especially for you."

Ally perks up. "I love eclairs."

~

The eclairs are arranged on tiny dessert plates with a sprig of mint and two raspberries each. Ava, he notices, doesn't seem interested in actually eating hers. She's missing out: they're really good eclairs.

The coffee's good, too. Even Ava's drinking it.

Gently, she sets her cup down in the saucer. Unlike Ally, she's somehow avoided leaving lipstick smudges on the rim. "I'll go get that list we need to discuss and we can go over it together," she says, standing.

"Haven't said yes yet, Mom," Ally calls to her as she's walking away.

Ava waves a dismissive hand just before she disappears around the corner. "Oh, Ally, don't be ridiculous. Of course you will!"

More to herself than to him, Ally mutters, "Of course I will. God, I hate that she's right."

When Ava returns, she's holding three sheets of paper. She hands one to Ally and one to him and then sits back down.

"I leave a week from next Wednesday and return the following Tuesday," she says. "Everythingyou'll need to look after is on this list. The housekeeper comes on Thursdays and Tuesdays, so you'll have to make sure you're here to keep an eye on her on both days. My flight doesn't get in until late afternoon."

"Mom, you've had the same housekeeper for at least a decade. I think you can trust her at this point."

Ava ignores her and keeps going. "Now, the African violets may need watering. If so, remember, Ally: you put them in the tray and water them from below."

"I know how to water your plants, Mom. I did it all through high school, remember?"

"Saturday is when the gardeners come by, but of course you don't need to be here for that."

"Of course." And that's the sound of Ally talking through gritted teeth.

Colin zones out at that point and waits for the point-by-point review to stop. It's a long list: it's probably going to take a while.

~

In fact, it seems like it takes forever until Ava finally finishes with them. She hasn't spoken to him much since the initial inquisition. Mostly, he thinks he was there to be observed. Kind of like a zoo animal.

"Thank you so much, Ally." She gives her daughter an air kiss on each cheek. "You've no idea what a relief it is to have you look after things while I'm away."

"Oh, I think I have some idea," Ally says, eyeing the approaching taxi with obvious relief of her own. "Bye, Mom. I guess I'll see you at the airport a week from Wednesday."

He gets a fingertip handshake, not air kisses. "It was so lovely to finally, properly meet you, Colin. It's not often Ally allows me to meet her young men." She smiles pityingly at Ally. "Oh, Ally, do consider going to my hairdresser next time. Janine can work miracles with hair like yours."

~

"Sorry about Mom," Ally tells him. She's leaning up against him in the back of the cab, the leftovers he's pretty sure they won't be eating sitting in a bag at her feet.

"I can't say you didn't warn me."

"You don't actually have to stay there with me if you're busy."

"We have gigs Friday and Saturday, but I'll come out after those if you want me to."

"Why wouldn't I want you to?"

"I can't think of any reasons, but that doesn't mean you don't have some. Of course, they wouldn't be good reasons."

"Does my hair really look that bad?" Ally picks up a strand and frowns at it.

"Your hair looks great."

"Maybe I should get bangs."

"Maybe we should, once we get back home, get some pizza and watch a movie and you can sleep on the idea of bangs. I've got _Blues Brothers_."

"Chinese?" she asks. "We just had pizza."

"Chinese and _Blues Brothers_?"

"Chinese and _Blues Brothers_. Oh, and Milk Duds."

"Deal," he says.

"God, I wish she hadn't put the leftovers in glass containers. I'd throw them out at the station if she'd put them in bags like a normal person. Now I'll have to lug them home, then throw them out, then wash them, then lug them back."

"Is her cooking usually that bad?"

"Actually, she's improved a lot. Dad was always the chef in the family."

Colin remembers his dad struggling and failing with anything more complicated than spaghetti after the divorce and actually feels a reluctant twinge of sympathy for Ava. Still…"Next time, we should offer to bring takeout."

Ally snuggles a little closer. "Unless it's something where she's hired caterers, that's always a good plan."

 

~*~

 

The Monday before her mom leaves for London, Colin's band gets a last-minute replacement booking for a Thursday night high school reunion. It doesn't make sense for him to come out for one night and then go right back in morning, so Ally spends the first half of the week alone in the house. Teenage her would have killed for the opportunity. Present-day her is bored out of her skull and missing Colin. Connecting by phone just isn't the same, though she gets some really impressive photos sent via text out of it and sends a few in return. Probably should have packed her vibrator.

Plus, her room smells disconcertingly like a B&B. Mom's put out at least three bowls of potpourri that she can see. Honestly, it probably smells better now than when she lived here. Back then, the room had a seemingly-permanent funk of Tommy Girl and Aqua Net Extra Super Hold going on. Not that that makes the B&B atmosphere in any way less disconcerting.

By the time Sunday rolls around, Ally's so bored, she's pretty much crawling out of her skin. When her phone starts playing Lionel Richie while she's washing her hands, she nearly drops it into the toilet in her haste to see Colin's text.

_Be there in ten. Brought you something._

~

Colin arrives with a gym bag slung over his shoulder and a pastry box in hand. "I brought cannoli," he says, handing it to her. "And an eclair. And a few donuts. I wasn't sure which you'd want."

The answer to that is all of the above, but the food is going to have to wait. "I want you first, then we can talk food."

~

Half an hour later, they're on her bed, satisfyingly naked and sweaty. They didn't even make it under the decorative bedspread. She'll probably need to get it dry cleaned. The ceiling of her childhood bedroom hasn't changed much, even though Ally suspects her mom's had it painted at least once. She's had a lot of sex under that ceiling and she's pretty sure there used to be a stain a little to the right of her headboard.

"Did you know that this is the very first place I had sex? Number one, right in this bed."

"And with Gerry Perry, the sad puppet man. I feel like I'm visiting a national monument to your poor life choices. And defiling it."

She elbows him. "So who'd you lose your virginity to and where? Or was that so long ago that you don't remember?"

"Come on, Ally. You of all people should know you never forget your first, even if it's so horrifically embarrassing that you—and, in my case, the other party—probably wish you could. I guess you could say I was someone's Gerry Perry."

"Oh yeah? Spill."

"Her name was Sarah Hardiman, I was 19, she was 22 and a friend of my sister's. It was at her place and I think she felt sorry for me. Before and after. Especially after."

She looks over at him in disbelief. "Nineteen. You?"

"Trust me, I was a late bloomer. When you meet my family, I am painfully certain they'll show you the evidence. Braces and everything."

"Yeah, still can't quite believe it."

"Believe it. Not only was I a late bloomer, I was a huge band geek, and let me tell you, it was nothing like the American Pie movies."

"Band camp was a bust?"

"Band camp more than a bust. Band camp was chicken pox and quarantine."

"Ouch."

"All over."

"All over? Holy shit."

"Everywhere. I couldn't even take a leak without crying and I was probably the only 16-year-old boy alive who knew what it was like to go a month without masturbating. I still get phantom pains when I think about it."

"I don't even have a penis and I'm getting phantom pains thinking about it. Want me to kiss it and make it better?"

"I wouldn't say no, but there are cannoli waiting downstairs and I haven't actually eaten yet, so why don't I take a rain check?"

~

Ally'd eaten some of Mom's yogurt after waking up, but apparently, she's still pretty hungry because she ends up eating the eclair, two cannoli, and half of Colin's donut. After they've eaten and gone back upstairs, after she's gone down on her knees on her bedroom floor and he's returned the favor and gone down on her on the bed, Colin looks around her room, clearly cataloging each and every item in it. "Does your mom really have every ribbon, certificate, and award you've every gotten up on your walls still?"

"Mom's left our rooms just like they were. Well, pretty much. There used to be more posters and magazine covers and stuff all over the place." Pretty much everything that gave the room enough personality to overcome the Laura Ashley wallpaper and matching bedding has been removed, including her art, though she's the one who took that down. "And fewer potpourri bowls."

Come to think of it, the room's not really hers anymore. It belongs to whatever ideal Ally Darling Mom wishes she was. Jake Adams would go well with this room. Colin sticks out in it like a stupidly sexy sore thumb. He fits in at her place, though, which is the important part. Jake—obviously—did not. God, why does being back at Mom's make her feel like she's regressing? She shouldn't even be thinking like this.

"Want to go for a walk?" she asks, a little more desperately than she'd intended for the words to come out.

"Sure, just let me wash off my face."

~

It's nice out. Well, no, it's overcast and kind of muggy out. It's more like it's nice to be out of the house. It would be even nicer if she could somehow have managed to bring a bubble of the air conditioning with them, 'cause she's sweating through her tank top and she forgot to put on deodorant. Not that it would have done much about the fact that they didn't shower after either of the times they had sex.

Ally slips her hand into Colin's and starts walking. She realizes a few steps into it that she's planned on taking him on their old trick or treating route, just skipping the part where they knock on doors and get candy.

"And that's the Perry residence," she says, pointing to the house next door with her free hand and edging closer to him.

"Nice house," says Colin.

"Mom hates it. She claims Mrs Perry stole all her interior decor ideas from her."

"And did she?"

"You know, I really couldn't tell you. I haven't seen the inside since before you-know-what happened with you-know-who. But I think they used the same decorator. Mom was so angry that she redid most of the house with a different decorator. That's how I got my couch. In fact, Mom redecorating is how I got a lot of my furniture." Couch, bed, dresser. Bookshelves. "She redecorated again after the divorce. I think it's her version of getting bangs."

"At yet, she never redoes your rooms."

"Nope. She never does."

"My folks would have changed them the moment we were out of the house. As a matter of fact, they did change them the moment we were out of the house, which turned out to be kinda awkward when I had to move back home after I dropped out of college."

"Really?"

"That's why I ended up at Mom's and not Dad's. At least she'd just changed it into a spare bedroom. He'd changed it into an office."

Across the street, Ally sees the curtains on Mrs Herman's front window twitching. The old busybody is no doubt taking notes to take to her bridge club with her. Or it could be she's planning to call the cops if she hasn't recognized Ally. She probably thinks they look like they're casing the neighborhood.

"That's where the Prescotts lived," she tells him, pointing to the house next to Mrs Herman's. "They gave out full-sized Snickers every year until they divorced and had to sell the house. The Gibsons only gave out Sweet Tarts. Mrs Perry was mini Twizzlers."

He starts laughing. "Wait, are you taking me on your trick or treating route?"

"Yes?" she says. "To be fair, it's the neighborhood walk I know best. Mrs Herman over there always kept her porch light off."

"What'd your parents give out?"

"Those assorted Hershey's minis. Until the Prescotts started with the Snickers and Mom moved to full-sized Three Musketeers to keep up. What about yours?"

"Tootsie Roll Pops."

~

Daisy and Eddie come by Monday night, which Ally wasn't expecting.

"Colin, this is Eddie. Eddie, this is Colin," Ally says. To Daisy, she says, "I didn't know you were coming over."

"They're painting the nursery," Daisy explains. "I didn't want to be around the fumes and Mom's not home." She smiles. It's deceptively sweet. Ally's knows that means she's up to something. "I took the chance that you'd be wearing clothes."

"Well, I'm not exactly going to wander around Mom's naked," says Ally, although she actually has been.

Daisy smiles again. "That was directed at Colin. Eddie, remember that neighbor of Ally's I told you about who was playing the guitar mostly naked on her couch?"

"Let me go out on a limb and guess it was you," Eddie says, shaking Colin's hand. "You kind of made an interesting first impression on Daisy."

Colin raises his eyebrows. "So I'm gathering."

"You came over here to inspect my boyfriend, didn't you?" At least Colin looks amused. Ally's not.

"I came over here to avoid volatile organic compounds," Daisy says, primly. Then she grins. "And to inspect your boyfriend."

"You could have just gone over to my place," says Ally. "It's empty and you have a spare key."

~ 

Daisy orders pizza. A lot of pizza. "I'm eating for two," she says, shoving another slice of pepperoni in her face. "Pass me a slice of the sausage and pepperoncini. My stomach's in the way and I can't reach it."

"You're going to wind up with heartburn again," Eddie says. He passes her a slice anyway.

"I end up with heartburn no matter what I eat."

"So did my sister," says Colin. "So, at least according to her, you might as well eat what you like."

Daisy smiles. "Thank you. See, Eddie?"

"Hey, Ally," Eddie says. "Daisy said I should tell you, Mike really liked the cake topper you made for us. He has a boutique and is looking for consignments. I gave him your card."

"Groomsman Mike or basketball Mike?" Both of them were at the wedding.

"Groomsman Mike."

Thank god. Basketball Mike was only a technical foul away from making her list. She wonders for a moment if he's done anything about his premature ejaculation problem and decides that she'd really rather not know.

~

Ally corners Daisy outside the hall bathroom the fifth time her sister makes a trip to it.

"What are you doing?"

"Going pee. The baby's squishing my bladder. Also, you should let me go and do that before I pee myself."

"I'm coming in with you," says Ally.

"The bathroom's the size of a closet."

"We'll squeeze."

Daisy narrows her eyes. "Fine. Upstairs, but hurry. I'm serious about peeing myself."

~

"Why does the wallpaper in here match your bedroom, not mine?" Ally asks. She's sitting on the edge of the bathtub, staring at the walls while Daisy's using the toilet.

"I don't know, maybe because it's attached to my bedroom? Pass me a roll of toilet paper. Someone used the last one and didn't replace it."

Ally pulls a fresh roll out from under the vanity and holds it captive. "We weren't expecting company and Colin knows where Mom keeps it. Tell you what, I'll pass you the Charmin if you tell me what you're doing."

Daisy gapes at her and narrows her eyes. "That's not fair."

"Neither is ambushing me and my boyfriend."

"If I hadn't come by, you never would have let me meet him. You disappeared into the boyfriend vortex after my wedding."

Ally squeezes the toilet paper and tosses it Daisy's way. "You've already met him."

"But he wasn't your boyfriend when I met him." Daisy wipes and flushes and is in the process of standing up when she swears and sits back down. "Damn it, I have to pee again."

"Do you have to pee this much all the time? It sounds like someone opened up a fire hydrant."

Her sister sighs and admits, "No, but I made Eddie stop at 7-Eleven because I wanted a Slurpee and then I drank most of his Big Gulp because I was still thirsty."

"Wow."

"Enough about pee. How's the sex?"

"Daisy!" Ally laughs. "Fine, if you must know, really, really good. Like, really good. What do you think of him?"

"I think you seem happy."

"That's not really an answer."

"You'll just have to wait until I get to know him as your boyfriend. Let's go back down before Eddie starts to wonder if I fell in."

Ally pushes down her frustration. Daisy's right, she doesn't have enough to go on, but Ally still doesn't want to wait for her seal of approval. She wants it now so she can shove Mom's voice out of her head about this once and for all. 


	2. Chapter 2

Between his packed schedule of end-of-summer weddings, birthdays, reunions, and other celebrations, and Ally staying up late most nights working on her steadily-increasing number of custom orders, there's about a two week period where Colin feels like they barely get to see each other. They still sleep in the same bed for most of it—his, because Ally's stuck about a dozen cooling racks on her bed so she can use it as an additional drying area. Most nights, the most they can manage is sleeping. It's been driving both of them crazy, and not the good kind of crazy.

Not last night, though. Last night was a classic movie marathon followed by some pretty spectacular ways of driving each other the good kind of crazy in his bed. In fact, a lot of pretty spectacular ways of driving each other the good kind of crazy. They've even managed to continue it well into the morning, though that's been more on the couch than in the bed.

When Colin looks at the clock, it's almost noon. He should probably eat, and he is hungry, but he honestly can't decide between the lapful of naked Ally he has now or the stomach full of food he could have if they moved. "Hey, you hungry?" he asks. 

She raises her head off his chest. "Starving, but there's nothing in your fridge and unless we order pizza, we'd have to get dressed."

They've had way too much pizza in the last few weeks. "Or…we could hit the farmer's market. Get some of those pastries you like and some tomatoes for dinner tacos."

"Are we doing dinner tacos?"

"We are if we hit the farmer's market. Dinner tacos and maybe some Three Stooges."

"Stooges no, Marx Brothers maybe."

"We still have to get dressed, though." He gently pushes her off his lap and goes to do just that.

With a groan, Ally gets up and throws on yesterday's paint-stained pants and one of his clean t-shirts. No bra, no underwear, and she doesn't bother to brush her hair or put on makeup either. There's a smudge of blue paint on her hand from before she'd finished painting the last of the orders and her face is still has a little bit of a post-coital flush to it.

"You look amazing," he tells her. He means it. 

~ 

At the farmer's market, Colin spots the formerly disgusting Donald walking their way. Ally doesn't see him, because she's eating a pastry and looking at the case like she's trying to decide if she should order another. He thinks about warning her, but it wouldn't be as much fun as seeing what she does. He's heard her Donald encounter stories.

Donald sees Ally before Ally sees Donald. "Ally," he says with what sounds like about a hundred and ten percent resigned disbelief. He's got a huge bag of produce on each arm, one with a baguette sticking out of it, or else Colin suspects he'd have already made a break for it.

She goes full-on deer in the headlights and then frantically wipes the powdered sugar off her face, quickly swallowing her mouthful of pastry. "Donald! Hi! Gosh, wow. Imagine running into you here!"

"Yeah. Imagine that."

Colin slides his arm around Ally's waist and tries to keep from laughing. "Hey, hon, aren't you going to introduce us?"

"Donald, this is Colin. My boyfriend."

"What happened to Pierre?" Ah, yes. North Pole Pierre.

"Ooo. Pierre. Right-" Ally nudges him with her elbow. Twice.

He takes the hint. "They grew apart. The long distance thing was just too much."

"Yeah," Ally says. "He offered to quit his job if it would fix things, but I knew he'd regret it, so I had to let him go. Like in _Casablanca_." Which, conveniently, they'd watched just last night.

"Ally was Rick and the world was Laszlo."

"And Colin was waiting for me, just across the hall. It was the beginning of a beautiful friendship."

"I'm not really Louis though. That's where the comparison falls apart. Unless there's some director's cut where Rick and Louis spend a solid week having the best sex of their lives once they finally figure out what they're doing."

"Wow." Donald looks more like he's ready to bolt than he had when they first ran into him. "That's really…great, Ally. That's great."

"Crazy, right?" Colin says.

"Yep. Sure is. Crazy. Nice running into you. I've got to. Go. I've got to go."

Colin's proud of himself. He manages not to burst out laughing until Donald's almost out of hearing range. "Oh, Ally." He's pretty sure his favorite thing in the world right now is Ally just being Ally. No, he knows it's his favorite thing. 

She's watching Donald's retreat with wide-eyed disbelief. "Oh my GOD! Why do I keep running into him?"

"How many times is this now, what, six?"

"Five."

"The look on your face was priceless. Do you think I oversold the sex?"

"Maybe a little."

"You're right, it was two or three days, not a week. But it was amazing."

"Best of your life?" she asks.

"I think that was last night. Maybe this morning."

"I liked this morning."

"I could tell. I think you pulled out half the hair on the back of my head. It was pretty hot."

"What can I say?" she says. "You make my vagina happy."

~

He's is trying to decide between two nearly-identical tomatoes when he hears someone—a male someone—say, "Ally?"

"Hi?" she replies, clearly unable to place the guy. Colin takes his attention away from the tomatoes. "Colin, this is…" She frowns.

Said guy, who looks like he should be in the dictionary next to the word nondescript, puts out his hand. "Dave Christensen. Ally and I dated in college."

Well, that's a surprise. The clammy handshake isn't, though. "Good to meet you, Dave."

"Ally, god, you look great. Really just amazing. What have you been up to?" He's looking at Ally with his tongue practically hanging out and failing to notice that she looks like she wants to be just about anywhere else. Colin does not like Dave Christensen.

"Oh, you know," she says desperately. "Working. Living. Playing."

Colin puts his arm around her waist, hoping he'll get the hint. "Ally just started her own company. It keeps us busy."

Dave pulls out his wallet and starts fishing around for something. It turns out to be a business card, which he hands to her. "You know, I'm an accountant now, so if you ever need one, here's my number. Or if you just want to call. Maybe we could get a drink and talk about the good old days."

In a strained voice, she says, "Sure. That sounds…great."

~

"I don't remember a Dave Christensen on the list," Colin says when they're back at his place. He gave up on choosing between the tomatoes and bought both of them. They're currently sitting on his kitchen counter in all their organic heirloom glory. Maybe they can do BLTs tomorrow or something.

Ally groans. "That's because I didn't remember that Dave Christensen existed."

"And yet, apparently, you dated him."

"I didn't date him." She looks irritated and affronted at the suggestion. "He used to follow me around after class. I slept with him in a moment of drunken self-loathing after Tom dumped me and then I transferred out of the class we shared and purposefully forgot all about him until now. Shit. Plus the asshole stole my panties."

"So you're back at twenty-one."

She does a back flop onto the bed and puts her hands over her face. "God, don't remind me. I am such a whore."

"I dunno, I kinda like that he raised your number. Now I'll always know you're not just settling for me for the sake of it." Not that he actually thinks she was. But from the way she's acting, she needs reminding that it doesn't matter how many people she's had sex with. It could be fifty for all he cares. Or a hundred. He's sure as hell not in any position to judge. "Anyhow, the experience has served you well. You're awesome in bed."

"Thanks. God, why is it always my exes we run into? Why don't we ever run into one of the hundreds your one-night stands?"

"Despite what I may have led you to believe, it's more like several dozen than hundreds, and I guess I'm just lucky."

"Or we run into them and they just don't admit that they know you. That seems more likely." She takes her hands off her face. "God, I can't believe I forgot all about Dave Christensen. Believe it or not, he was worse than Gerry Perry."

"Of course he was. Gerry Perry, you felt sorry for. Dave Christensen's a spineless dick who took advantage of your drunken misery. Chicken or beef for the tacos? We could do carnitas, but I forgot to grab pork, so we'd have to go back out."

"I don't know. I want carnitas, but if we go back out, with my luck, I'll probably run into someone else."

"Well, I have located most of them, so I can steer us clear of pretty much everyone. Except for Donald. Donald is apparently a wild card and, sadly, I don't think I can put a tracker on him so we'll know his location, but odds are we won't run into him twice in one day, so we could still do carnitas."

Ally sits up. "Sure, what the hell, why not? I am not going to let my mistakes keep me from my pork."

~*~

Despite what she'd said, Ally doesn't seriously expect that they'll ever run into one of Colin's conquests. And yet, just a few days after running into both Donald and Dave, they're walking down the street on their way to meet  Dad and Jacinda for lunch when Colin says, "Oh, shit!" If they were anywhere near a telephone pole, he'd probably be jumping behind it.

"Colin!" The speaker is a tall, unfairly gorgeous woman with perfect golden skin, perfect black hair, and perfectly manicured nails. She's dressed in a tailored business suit that looks like it cost at least two months of Ally's rent and sporting a wedding set that looks like it cost most of the down payment on a house. She even has a faint hint of an English accent. A real one.

"Victoria. Hi." He shuffles awkwardly. And yep, Colin's luck has finally run out. Ally's isn't that great, either. It's not fair that the one he runs into is so…perfect. "This is my girlfriend, Ally. Ally, this is Victoria. We dated right after she graduated from law school."   Dated. So not just one of the conquests. 

"Right after I passed the bar," Victoria corrects him gently. Ally would be willing to swear that her dark brown eyes actually twinkle.

"Which was right after you graduated from law school."

"I've never been introduced to one of Colin's ex-girlfriends before," Ally says. "It's so nice to meet you."

"Thank you, that's so sweet of you to say." Oh, god, she's sincere. When she smiles, even her teeth are perfect. "It was lovely running into you, Colin, but I have to hurry back to the office. Say hello to your mother for me. And it was lovely meeting you, too, Ally. I'm so happy Colin's found someone." Another wide, perfect smile and she's on her way.

"Wow, I'm amazed you actually dated someone for long enough for them to even know you had a mother, let alone meet her. You never told me about her."

"She only knows I have a mother because we met at Mom's retirement party and I did tell you about her. She's the one who had the princess picture next to her bed."

"Now that I've seen her, I can't believe you dumped her."

"Why not? After all, you dumped Jake Adams."

"Yeah, but Jake Adams wouldn't have made me happy. She looks like every guy's fantasy, complete with the fancy accent."

Colin shrugs. "We wanted totally different things. And she didn't make me happy."

~

Thanks to Victoria, they're a little late getting to the restaurant. Thank god it's Dad they're meeting, not Mom. Even running late, Ally half expects that they'll still beat him there. She's wrong. Dad and Jacinda are already seated, talking animatedly and simultaneously texting. Probably to each other.

"Ally!" Her dad stands up from the table and gives her a bear hug.

"Oof. Hi, Dad."

"Colin, Jacinda! Come over here so we get a quick selfie with all four of us."

"He's been so excited to finally meet you in person!" Jacinda says. Colin and Dad have been following each other on Twitter for weeks. Ally learns more about what her dad's doing from his DMs to her boyfriend than she does from Dad himself these days.

Everyone obligingly squeezes together tightly enough for Dad to get his picture before they sit down.

"So what's the occasion, Dad? You said you had something to tell me?" At least she knows it won't be a surprise brother or sister. She's pretty sure Jacinda is young enough for that to still be possible, but Dad got snipped when Daisy was five and Ally remembers the aftermath.

"Well, a few weeks ago, while we were in the Bahamas, Jacinda and I talked a lot about the future and seeing you take your chance was all the push we needed: she's agreed to make an honest man out of me. I wanted to tell you before we tell Twitter."

After she gets over being temporarily frozen with shock, Ally glances at Jacinda's left hand. Sure enough, there's a ring on it. A weird, funky, chunky kind of ring that looks like it's supposed to be some sort of semi-abstract tree branch or something, but it's still a ring. It's even got a stone in it. A red one. Wow. Mom is not going to be pleased about this. "Does Daisy know?" Dad getting married again is not something Ally ever expected. Even the surprise brother or sister seemed more likely than that.

"Of course she does, sweetie. We told her when she and Eddie came over for dinner last week. She's given us her blessing."

"Does Mom know?"

"She does, but Ally, there's nothing for you to worry about: we're both adults and we need to finally put our differences behind us. After all, we'll be grandparents before too long."

"Great. That's great. So when's the wedding?"

"We're not going to have a big ceremony," Jacinda says.

Dad adds, "We've both done that before and it's just not us. We're just planning on a City Hall wedding sometime this year and a small reception to follow next summer. We'd like it if you and Colin would do us the honor of being a part of it."

"Just let us know your schedule"—Jacinda again—"and we'll save the date."

Fuck. Shit. Fuck. Damn. Colin gives her a worried look when she doesn't say anything and bumps her leg with his under the table.

"Mine's pretty packed right now, Terry. It's a busy time of the year," Colin says. Ally knows it's not. They've already entered the lull between wedding season and holiday parties.

"How about I let you know when Colin has a day that he's free?" Ally says.

Dad gives her a gentle, understanding smile that tells her he's not fooled at all. "That's fine, Ally. We're not in a rush. When you've figured out when—and if—you and Colin can do it, just say the word."

"Thanks, Dad. I'm really happy for you. Both of you." She is. She really is.

"Then let's order some mimosas. Time to celebrate!"

She downs her first so fast that Colin just hands her his instead of making her wait for the waiter to come by again.

~

"You okay?" Colin asks when they get back to her place.

"Never been better," she lies.

"I think that's your third mimosa talking."

"It could be."

"Want me to say I'm booked until the end of the year?"

"No. It's fine. I'm sure Mom already blames me and I don't want to hurt Dad's feelings by saying no. It means a lot to him."

"I like him."

"Dad's a likable guy."

"I like you more, though. You can say no, you know, Ally."

She does know that. She's just never been good at it.

~

Ally calls Daisy the next morning. "Dad just told me he's getting married. Why didn't you tell me?"

"I don't know, maybe because it was his news to share?"

"They want Colin and me to be at the wedding."

"So will you?"

"Mom'll kill me."

"Mom won't kill you, Ally. I have to get back to work. I'll call you later?"

"I'm kinda hoping for sooner. Are you free to meet up for lunch?"

~

She hasn't seen Daisy since they were at Mom's, so the first thing Ally blurts out when she sees her is, "Holy shit, you're huge."

"I'm not huge. I'm the normal size for someone who's having a baby in three months."

"Might be normal, but it's still huge. What am I going to do about Dad?"

"I don't know, Ally. What do you want to do about Dad? By the way, I've already ordered our food because you're ten minutes late and I have an actual job. You're having the chicken salad wrap."

"Mine's an actual job, too, you know. I just set my own hours. God, why couldn't he have just eloped and told us after the deed was already done?"

"Because he wants his family there with him."

"You're his family. And he only met Colin in person yesterday."

"But I'm not the one who inspired him to go all carpe diem with our new mom." Daisy gives her a bright smile and takes a sip of her Perrier. "And Colin's your boyfriend. If Dad wants you there, of course he'd ask him to come."

The waiter comes by with their food. Ally takes a bite of the chicken salad wrap and decides Daisy's punishing her for something. Probably for making her meet her for lunch. Or for being late meeting her. Or both.

She sets the wrap down and grabs her water to wash the taste out of her mouth before saying, "I don't get it. She's barely older than I am."

"She makes him happy, though."

"I just feel like maybe he's rushing into things just because they make him feel good and he's not thinking long-term. Sure, he's happy now, but what do they have in common? Other than sex."

"Okay, first, you sound like Mom and you need to stop and please don't make me think about Dad and sex. Second, Ally, are we still talking about Dad?"

"What? Yes, we're talking about Dad."

"Okay, I just wanted to make sure."

"What makes you think I wasn't talking about Dad?"

"Maybe because Dad's been with Jacinda since about six months after he and Mom got divorced and you're the one who just started seeing someone? And also because it sounded like you were projecting."

"Well, I'm not. It's not about Colin. It's about Dad."

"Have you two already moved in together or something without telling me and now you're regretting it? Half the time when I call, he answers the phone."

"No and no and it's on his side of the bed."

Daisy smirks at her. "He has a side of the bed?"

"He has the side of the bed that's not my side of the bed. And when we're at his place, I have the side of the bed that's not his side of the bed. The phone's on his side of the bed both places."

"Does he keep a toothbrush at your place or does he just go across the hall and use his own?"

"He has one at mine and I have one at his. We're not rushing into anything. And we're talking about Dad, remember?"

"Fine. Mom's not going to disown you for being in Dad's wedding if you want to be in it."

"She almost refused to come to your wedding because Dad was going to be there! The only reason she relented was Jake Adams! He was the get out of jail free card! Colin's not a get out of jail free card!"

Daisy frowns and opens her mouth like she's about to say something, but instead, she winces suddenly and starts rubbing her side. "God, I swear he or she's going to be a soccer player. Want to feel?" She doesn't give Ally much of a choice, dragging her hand over to the spot she just rubbed. "There, feel it?"

Something thumps the palm of her hand where it's pressed against Daisy's shirt. "That's really weird."

"It's even weirder when I'm naked and I'm looking at it. Anyhow, Mom's not going to disown you. She's even inviting Jacinda to the baby shower."

"God, Daisy, tell me you're not having it at Mom's."

The response from her sister is borderline hysterical laughter. "Oh, god no! No. God no. Mom wants me to, but no. I'm having it at my house. All she's in charge of is food and invitations."

"Yeah, that seems safer." Ally hesitates, then asks, "Do you really think I'm taking things too fast with Colin?" Daisy knows her better than almost anyone, and if Daisy thinks she's projecting....

"I never said anything about you taking things too fast with Colin. Unless you've let him in the backdoor. In that case, I'd say you are definitely taking things too fast."

"Then I guess you could say we're taking it slowly."

"Oh thank god. I was worried."

"But just about the backdoor, right? Not that we're going too fast."

Daisy shakes her head, pulls some money out of her purse, and drops it on the table. "Stop being so weird, Ally. Just call Dad and tell him yes or no. I have to get back to work."

~

Ally's lunch isn't sitting well with her. More specifically, because she only ate a few bites of the actual lunch, her lunch conversation isn't sitting well with her. Even more specifically, it's Daisy accusing her of projecting that isn't sitting well. She needs to think, which means she needs to find something to do that's not going back home, because if she goes back home, Colin will be there and he's what she needs to think about. No, why she's suddenly freaking out about something she thought she was sure about is what she needs to think about.

She heads to the art supply store, telling herself she probably needs to get a new batch of brushes, anyway. Colin makes her feel good, but apparently, so would cocaine, and no one would suggest that she start up a long-term relationship with that.

No, that's a stupid comparison. Yeah, sure, the sex is probably good enough to qualify as addictive, but that's not all that she's there for and it's not all they have in common. She actually likes him. She liked him before she started sleeping with him. They go well together. Sure, he's not the kind of guy she imagined herself with, but if she's learned anything about herself this year, it's that most of what she imagined about her future self doesn't have a lot to do with her actual self.

But that's the problem: she's still not entirely sure what all of her is her actual self. She thought she was, but maybe she's wrong. It sure as hell wouldn't be the first time and there's no way she's managed to undo thirty some-odd years of self-deception in about three months.

A hundred dollars worth of art supplies she probably can't afford but can at least deduct as a business expense later, and she's still not sure how to figure that out. Or why she's freaking out.

~ 

"How was lunch with Daisy?" Colin asks when she gets back home. He closes the lid on his laptop, takes the headphones off from around his neck, and sets them down next to it.

Ally unpacks the brushes and paints she bought and puts them away. She takes the old brushes that are past salvaging out of the brush jar and drops them in the wastebasket. "I found out I can't stand chicken salad wraps," she says, coming over to sit next to him on the couch. "And I still don't know what I'm going to say to Dad about his wedding."

"Well, that sure sounds like it went well. Hey, if you're still hungry, I can duck across the hall and grab what's left of the chow mein from the other night."

"I'm starving," she says. "But at least Daisy paid for the meal."

He gives her a quick kiss before standing up. "Be right back."

"Thanks." He still has his place, she still has her place. No one's rushing anything and there's nothing to freak out about.

~*~

"Have you seen my pink bra?" Ally's digging through the laundry basket, tossing the clothing that isn't the bra she's looking for behind her. Most of it hits the couch.

Colin looks up from the notebook where he's been jotting down lyrics that sound like he lifted them from a pre-teen girl's diary, which feels like all he can manage to write when Ally's around. "The hot pink one with black lace or the bubblegum one with the polka dots?"

"Polka dots."

Makes sense. She's already wearing the matching panties.

"It's probably still at my place. I took it off you when we were making out on the couch the other night, remember? Hey, are those my socks?"

She balls them up and lobs them at him. "Sure are. And these are your boxers."

"The very same ones I was wearing when I met your mom. I was wondering where they went."

"They were wedged under the sheets at the foot of the bed."

It seems like as good a time as any to bring up something he's been wanting to talk with her about for a while. "Maybe we should talk about moving in together. It looks like our laundry already has."

It's not that he expects Ally to agree without at least taking some time to think about it, but he doesn't expect the way she freezes and then lets out a strained laugh. Or the way she looks at him like he's grown another head. She looks disturbingly like Ava.

"Don't you think it's a little soon to be asking me about that?" she says, voice eerily calm.

Shit. "Do you think it's too soon? I don't have much of a frame of reference."

"Way, way too soon, Colin. We've only been dating for three months."

"Okay, fine. We'll revisit the situation when all of our laundry starts cohabiting," he says, trying to keep his voice light. Obviously, he's misjudged the situation.

She throws a shirt at him, then another. "The only way your laundry even gets done is when you 'accidentally' toss it in with mine. Do you really think I'm that desperate to settle down?"

The way she says desperate stings. As does the implication that she'd be settling. "I never said that." One of the shirts currently residing on his notebook is actually hers. It's the one she wears when she has PMS and is feeling bloated. He throws it back at her.

"But I bet you thought it."

He grits his teeth. "No. What I thought is that the last time we spent a night apart was when I had a cold and didn't want you to catch it and even then, we still slept in the same apartment. We're already practically living together. We just pay double the rent."

"So go spend the night at home more often so you're getting your money's worth."

"Ally, you're being ridiculous."

"I'm being ridiculous? _I'm_ being ridiculous?"

"Yeah, you are."

"You just sprung it on me with no warning, and I'm the ridiculous one?"

"What the hell, Ally? I didn't spring anything on you. All I said is I wanted to talk about it! How is that springing it on you with no warning? That is the warning!"

"Because it is, that's why."

"What's wrong with moving in together?"

"For starters?

"Yes."

"You've broken my coffee pot. Twice."

"That's only technically true," he says, because they've been over this before and he's still right about it. "The second time was your fault." 

"How was the second time my fault? You dropped it, buddy, not me."

"And I told you, you left a huge box in the middle of the kitchen and I tripped over it."

"And I told you, you need to look where you're going."

"It was five in the morning. How was I supposed to know you'd haul a box of sculpting supplies into the middle of the kitchen for some reason after I'd gone to bed? That was weeks ago and I replaced it! I can't believe you're still mad about this!"

"It's not even about that! God, Colin, you have no idea how to be in a relationship!"

He's finding it hard to breathe; it feels like she's punched him. "Right. And you do." He grabs his keys from her counter before he can manage to make the situation even worse. "You know what, Ally? Forget it. Fine. I'll go home. Call me when you're ready to actually talk."

~*~

When Colin leaves, the door doesn't slam behind him, but it might as well have. 

She could have done a better job of handling that. Anyone could have done a better job of handling that. Her mom could have done a better job of handling that. Ally's standing there in just her underwear, crying and wondering what the hell she just did.

The inside of her brain feels like a bomb went off. It would be an understatement to say that she overreacted. A huge, enormous, gigantic understatement. She sits down on the pile of clean laundry she'd thrown at Colin. She has no idea how to fix any of this. She's not even sure how she managed to break it, but she sure as hell did from the look on his face. Shit.

At least she knows she wants to fix it. But she sure as hell needs to figure out why she reacted like this to the idea of a future involving leases and shared bills before she even tries. If she's honest with herself, she can't even make the excuse that she was blindsided by it. It's not like she hadn't thought a few times about asking him to move in with her before Dad's announcement and lunch with Daisy kicked off whatever the hell is going on in her head right now.

God, his timing really sucked. God, she's a horrible person.

A list might help. She could make a list. Of course, then the first notebook she sees is opened to a page filled with sappy song lyrics in Colin's handwriting. That makes her cry even harder, so she sets it down, downs a glass of red wine, and then, having girded her loins, makes the list.

Pros:

  * _Makes me happy_
  * _Don't have to wear makeup if I don't feel like it_
  * _Don't have to wear a bra_
  * _Great sex!!!_ (she underlines that one twice and then circles it)
  * _Survived meeting Mom_
  * _Usually makes the coffee so I doesn't have to, even if I have to be up early_ (ouch)
  * _Can just be myself_ (mostly)



Cons:

  * _~~Steals covers~~_
  * _Still a struggling musician_
  * _Future???_



It doesn't help.

"Ugh, this is ridiculous," she says, tearing the page out and balling it up. When she throws it, it ricochets off the edge of the trash can and lands inside one of Colin's shoes. "Great," she mutters.

Ally fishes it out and drops it in the trash can.

It's late afternoon and she's not even dressed. Not only that, she's still not wearing a bra because the bra she'd been planning on wearing is probably in Colin's apartment.

If they lived together, she'd at least have a better chance of keeping track of her lingerie.

Maybe she should have asked him about his credit score.

~

Ally checks her email to distract herself and finds three new orders, one of them custom.  As much as she doesn't love marketing, it sure has helped her get her business off the ground. It's yet another cake topper. She looks at the attached photos of the bride and groom and their dog. Cute dog. Looks a little like Bandit. She turns her head to tell Colin and oh. Right. 

She closes her email.

She pours another glass of wine.

Maybe she should have tried making a list of what's wrong with her instead of trying to figure out if there's something wrong with them because the answer to what's wrong with them seems to be her and she could have just cut out the middleman.

~*~

The thing he's forced to admit is, Ally's right: he doesn't have any idea how to be in a relationship.

The closest he's come was the couple of months he was seeing Victoria before she, well, okay, dumped him. Which was smart on her part: other than the sex, they didn't really have a lot in common. Actually, they didn't really even have that in common, either. It wasn't bad—hell, it was pretty good a good fifty percent of the time—but it wasn't great.

Definitely not good enough to make up for the fact that she was a workaholic just out of Harvard Law who woke up at five a.m. sharp every day and he was, well, a music school dropout who hated waking up before noon. Especially since all of their hookups were at her place seeing as he had three roommates and, unless it was the weekend, he had to be out of there as soon as she left the house at five-thirty. Weekends, he had to be out at six.

Come to think of it, if she wasn't pretty obviously married now, she'd probably be perfect for three or four of the many guys on Ally's list. Not, however, for him. If she hadn't beaten him to the punch, he's sure he'd have found the guts to break up with her before it got anywhere close to serious. He was actually relieved when she told him they needed to talk.

Not that it didn't sting a little to hear her say, "Colin, I like you, but…" and then saying she was too busy to waste her time on something that couldn't go anywhere.

Okay, she hadn't said "waste her time" so much as gone into what was, in hindsight, a hysterically funny full-on "it's not you, it's me" speech, complete with earnest references to her busy schedule and how it wouldn't be fair to him to try to make what they had into something it wasn't, not when her goal was to make partner.

And it was fine, because even though they'd been hooking up for most of a summer, they really weren't much more than friends with benefits who were mostly in it for the benefits.

What he has with Ally is uncharted territory and none of this is fine.

~

She does call, but not to talk. She makes that crystal clear. "I need to think for a while before we can talk about this," is what she says, in fact. She sounds wobbly and stuffy, so she's been crying.

"What the hell, Ally?"

"I love you," she says. He hears her blow her nose. "And yeah, I know I'm being a huge asshole. Later, okay?"

"Okay," he replies, not sure what else to say, but she's already hung up.

When she still hasn't called back and it's almost midnight, Colin considers going over and knocking on Ally's door, maybe even groveling, even though he's not even sure what he's supposed to be groveling about. Instead, he jots down more song lyrics (this time they all seem like they belong in music aimed at angsty teens), tries and fails to sleep by himself in his own bed, quietly picks out a few minor chords to go with the lyrics, then goes back to the bed where he's almost asleep when the dog in 6b starts barking to be let out.

"Shut up, Chomsky," he mutters, burying his head under a pillow to muffle the sound. Who the hell names their dog Chomsky, anyhow?

Bill Walters in 6b, that's who.

Although that doesn't seem like a Bill Walters name. Maybe he came with it.

The last thing he wants is for Ally to leave him, but it feels more and more like that's where this is heading.

He wakes up reaching for her and getting just a handful of bedsheets instead. He reaches for his phone, which says it's 7:02. It's also down to three percent charge on the battery because he didn't plug it in last night. Because his charger is still at Ally's.

Getting it back would be a legitimate use of his key, but it would also piss her off. With a groan, he gets out of bed and makes himself go look for the spare he's pretty sure he has somewhere. Unless it's over at Ally's, too, in which case he's going to have to buy another one.

After a false start in the kitchen, Colin finds it next to his guitar case. He plugs it in and goes back to sleep.

When he wakes up again, he checks his phone. No texts, no voicemail. His fingers hover over Ally's name in his contacts until he convinces himself not to call. Instead, he calls his sister.

"Hey, Katie."

"What do you need, Colin?" The kids are screaming at each other in the background. "Please let it be quick. I need to get Justin to practice and Jody to a playdate. Jacob's teething and I'm basically full up on kids right now."

He swallows. "I think I fucked up with Ally and I don't know what to do about it."

"Oh, Cols, I'm sorry. Give me a minute to settle the kids down and we can talk."

"Put Justin on the phone," he says, and she does.

"Arr, matey!"

Justin replies with a surprisingly fierce, "Arr!"

"Can you leave your sister alone for a minute? Your mom and me need to talk."

"Arr!"

"Can I get an aye?"

"Arr!" It's less fierce. He'll take it.

"Close enough. Thanks, buddy. Now hand the phone back to your mom."

"What happened?" Katie asks when she gets back the phone. "Oh, Christ. You didn't cheat, did you? Please tell me you didn't cheat."

"No! What? Of course I didn't cheat. Why would you even ask that?"

"Historically, you're not exactly the relationship type, little brother."

"Maybe I wasn't, but I am now. Jesus, Katie." This is all he needed on top of everything else. "I would never do that."

"I'm sorry. I'm still not used to it and I just thought—never mind, just tell me what happened."

"I don't know. I mentioned that maybe we should talk about moving in together and she blew up and I went home and told her to call when she was ready to talk and other than calling to tell me she wasn't, she hasn't."

"Wasn't what? Ready to talk or ready to move in together?"

"Ready to talk. She told me she loved me and hung up."

"I love you is a good sign. But you've only been dating for what, two months?"

"Three and I can't believe you're taking her side."

"I'm not taking anyone's side."

"So what do I do?"

Katie exhales. He can hear the kids screaming again. So much for Justin's detente with his sister. "I don't know. I think you need to wait it out. Shit, Jody's got the scissors again. I've gotta go. I'll call you later, okay?"

"Thanks. Sure."

"Love you."

"You too."

~ 

By midnight, Ally still hasn't called.

_I don't know what I did_ he texts. _Whatever it was, please tell me how I can fix it_

The three dots show up to let him know she's responding. Then they just sit there.

A minute later, there's a knock on his door.

Ally's eyes are puffy and bloodshot. Her nose is shiny and red. She's wearing one of his t-shirts, and not one of the clean ones, and that's about it. "I don't know if you can," she says. She starts crying as she steps inside. "Can you fix me?"

Feeling helpless, he says, "Ally, you don't need fixing."

"Yeah, well, that's where you're wrong," she says. "God, why do I do this to myself? You didn't do anything."

Gently, he closes his door. "Do you want to talk about it?"

She shakes her head. "Can we just curl up on your bed and watch Mexican wrestling until we pass out instead?"

Thankfully, he hasn't deleted it from his Tivo. "Sure. You want a beer?"

"Do you have tequila?"

Sadly, almost all his booze has migrated over to her place. "I have that bottle of Malibu Rum you were supposed to give to Richie and other than beer, that's it."

"God, that sounds great."

"Wait, I thought you hated Malibu Rum. You said it was gross."

Ally gives him a sad, weary smile. "No, I just said that I did because you hate it and I do that, even when I don't have to. I, Ally Darling, like Malibu Rum."

"How can you like Malibu Rum and hate mustard?"

"Because mustard's disgusting, Colin."

"No, mustard's delicious."

"Well you can have all of mine, 'cause I'm not eating it."

"So what else have you withheld your honest opinion about? At least you've always been honest about the mustard." Of course, they weren't together when she told him that. "Jesus Christ, I fell for you long before you cared what I thought. I love you because you're you, Ally, remember? Not because we like or hate the same stuff. You know that. Or I thought you did."

"I do know that. It was just the Malibu, I swear."

Colin thinks he believes her. He wants to believe her. "So do you want Coke with your sunscreen, or will you be having it neat?"

"With Coke."

~

Like she'd suggested, they curl up on the bed with Mexican wrestling playing on his TV, the volume down low. They haven't talked, but at least being in the same room is a start. Colin plays with the ends of her hair. She clearly hasn't brushed it. Or washed and conditioned it.

Ally leans into him. "I've missed you."

"Missed you, too," he says. He kisses the tip of her ear. "This bed's nowhere near as comfortable without you in it."

"Mine wasn't all that comfortable with just me, either."

"Sounds like we'll just have to make sure we've always got both of us in whichever bed we're in."

Ally smiles. "Sounds like."

He knows she doesn't want to talk, but—"You know all I was trying to do was talk about talking about living together, right?"

"I know. But then I started thinking about leases with our names on them and credit scores and what if Daisy was right and we're moving too fast and I panicked."

"It's high average. I don't make a lot of money, but I do know how to manage it. And what do you mean, what if Daisy was right? Daisy said we're moving too fast?"

"No, Daisy didn't say it. I just thought she said it, or she thought I said it. We were talking about Dad. All she said is that we're moving too fast if I've let you in the backdoor."

"Would you let me in the backdoor? Not that I'm asking."

"Daisy seems to think so."

"Daisy's given this a lot more thought than I'd have expected."

"Yeah, well, can't disagree with you there."

Colin takes the empty glass from her hand and sets it on the floor next to his empty beer bottle. "Do you want to take things slower?" As much as he doesn't, he will, if that's what she wants.

"I don't know what I want. That's the problem. Can we just pretend this didn't happen and keep doing what we've been doing?"

"No to the first, yes to the second. For now." He'll try, at least. 

"I'm sorry. I was an asshole, wasn't I?"

"Yeah," he says, honestly. "You really were."

"Are you still mad at me?"

"That depends. Are you still mad at me for no good reason?"

"No, but I'm mad at myself."

"Then no. Well, yes, but not as mad as I was. I love you, but fuck, Ally, at least talk to me next time. Don't just blow up." 


	3. Chapter 3

As much as Ally wants things to go back to how they were before the fight, it doesn't happen immediately. Colin's quieter. The first couple of days, he spends almost as much time at his place as he does at hers until she's close to screaming at him to stop giving her space.

After nearly a week, he finally stops without her having to scream and things between them go almost back to normal, even if they're still avoiding talking about what happened. At least they're doing a pretty good job of faking back to normal. Right now, Colin's on the couch in his boxers, picking at his guitar while Ally's working on an order. It's nice. 

"Richie's somehow managed to convince one of his friends to let us play at his bar this weekend," he says. "You know, you still haven't heard us play."

She finishes painting the tongue on the wedding dog and admits in the spirit of honesty, "I was worried I wouldn't like the style and then I'd lie about it and have to keep lying about it."

Colin strums a few bars of something comically ominous and sets the guitar aside. "I can see where that would have been awkward."

"Really awkward," she agrees. "I've done it before."

"Would you prefer to skip the awkward, or will you be coming along?"

"I'd like to skip the awkward, but I'll still come."

"If you don't like us, I'll gamely pretend I don't take it personally, I promise."

"That's a great incentive to be honest," Ally says. She flicks him with the water she's been using to clean her brushes.

"Remember, though, I can usually tell when you're lying."

"Couldn't tell I was lying about the Malibu."

"Clearly, I was sex-addled when you told me that and also, I can't believe anyone likes it."

"Yeah, well, I can't believe anyone likes mustard, so there you go."

~

She's not sure how to dress for Colin's show. Which is ridiculous, because she's dressed for plenty of shows in her time and she sure as hell hasn't worried much about how to dress in front of Colin before. He's already gone ahead to meet up with his band and get ready and she's still digging through her closet. T-shirt and jeans? T-shirt and a skirt? Dress?

There's always that black dress that makes him extra handsy when she wears it. And black's always appropriate. She pulls it out of the closet and lays it on top of the mattress while she digs out a push-up bra. Then she helplessly contemplates what to do with her hair and makeup. God, she's overthinking things. 

~

As it turns out, his band is a little poppy, a little punk, and they can all play their instruments, which is a huge improvement over the last musician she dated. And, thank god, she likes what they're playing. It's catchy. Really catchy. She recognizes some of it from Colin noodling around on the couch.

"This is our last song," he says as he catches her eyes. "And Ally, this one's for you." When he starts singing, she recognizes those stupid, sappy lyrics she'd found in her notebook after the fight.

~

"So, did you like it?" he asks her. After the show, they'd all gone over to Richie's apartment and Ally's now sitting on Colin's lap in one of Richie's chairs. They're both a little tipsy. "You can lie if you have to."

She kisses him, leaving a streak of the hot pink lip gloss she'd just reapplied across his mouth. "Know what? I really did. You were great."

"Really-really, or saving my feelings really?" He's got his hands on her thighs, fingertips teasing the skin below where the dress has ridden up. It's driving her nuts. So is the way he's nuzzling her neck. "You smell good," he says.

"Really-really."

"That's good, because we're playing there again on Halloween. You want to duck out of here and go to bed?"

Thank god. "Only if you're not planning on sleeping."

"Believe me"—he says and yeah, that's his hand, sliding up the inside of her leg again—"the last thing I'm planning on doing is sleeping."

~

Ally's been thinking since Colin dozed off. She's been doing a lot of that. There's just enough light coming in through the windows for her to see his face where it's mushed up against the pillow. He's smiling a little in his sleep, maybe drooling a little on the pillow side of his mouth. She's smiling a little just watching him.

She likes going to bed with him. She likes waking up with him. She really likes being around him pretty much all of the time.

It wouldn't be the first time she lived with someone. She doesn't hate the idea of it. She loves the idea of it when it's just an idea and not reality. Maybe they should talk about talking about it. Except that every time she thinks about it, she starts to freak out just a little. If they talked about it, she's worried she'd freak out a lot.

He mutters something that's definitely not actual English and pulls her closer. She can feel his penis squishing against her hip and god, she likes that, too, even if he has somehow pulled half the covers off her again.

~

In the morning, she waits until Colin's gone to the Y to work out and then she picks up her phone.

"Hey Dad?" she says. "Can we meet today for coffee? Just the two of us?"

Daisy wouldn't understand, Mom sure as hell wouldn't, but maybe Dad will.

~

Dad shows up at the coffee place five minutes after she does. He's dressed in a goofy Hawaiian shirt and a clashing pair of Bermuda shorts and the humidity's frizzing the ends of his hair as badly as it's frizzing hers. She waves at him from her table while he waits in line and gets an enthusiastic wave in return.

"This isn't about your wedding," she tells him as he sits down with an iced tea that's as tall as her head. "I mean, we can talk about that if you want to. I guess I just needed some Dad time."

He gives her a concerned look, eyebrows furrowing over his glasses. "Is everything all right, Ally?"

"Yes. No. Maybe? I don't know."

"What's going on, sweetie?"

She fidgets with her straw. "Colin thinks we should move in together."

"That's great, Ally! If that's what you want, that is."

"I don't know if that's what I want. I don't know what I want. I couldn't even talk to him about it without it turning into a fight and we never fight." She pauses, thinking about the coffee pot and the time he muted her phone thinking it was his when she was expecting a call and also the time she got paint on his best shirt right before he had a work gig because she'd grabbed it instead of her own. Oh, and when he used up the last of her good bubble bath. "Well, never seriously."

"What was it you fought about?"

"If we're moving too fast. It's only been three months." She'd moved in with Donald after one, but her landlord was raising the rent and her roommate had moved out, so there were extenuating circumstances. Besides, look how that turned out.

"I knew after three weeks I'd be spending the rest of my life with Jacinda. We moved in together the next month. Sometimes you just know."

"But what if you think you do and you don't?"

"You know, in all your life, I've never seen you happier than I've seen you these last few months. What are you afraid of, Ally?"

"I guess turning out like you and Mom, or like any of my other relationships. What if living together ruins everything?"

"Relationships have to move forward, sweetie. Otherwise, they go stagnant and fizzle out. You have to take that chance. And they're work." He pats her hand. "Your mom and I got married and then I guess we stopped working on it. After you girls left the house, we realized we didn't have anything in common anymore. Neither of us was happy. I was just the first one to say something."

"And you're happy now, right?"

"Happy as a clam. I know we look strange to a lot of people, maybe even to you, but we give each other what we need."

"We're free on Halloween," Ally says. "Colin's band has a show that night. You and Jacinda could come see them play after the wedding. And Dad? Thanks. For getting me."

"How could I not, sweetheart? You're an apple that didn't fall very far from the tree."

~

"Hey, I had coffee with Dad today," Ally flips to the page on pedicure trends in the magazine she's been reading. Nope, wouldn't do that one if you paid her. "You're still free during the day on Halloween, right?"

Colin sets his guitar case next to the couch. "I am."

"Good, 'cause as of this afternoon, that's the day of Dad's and Jacinda's wedding. They're buying us dinner after. Oh, and Dad says he's excited to come see the show."

"You agreed to go?"

"It'll make him happy," she says, and turns to the next page. "And I think I need to."

 

~*~

 

The last thing Colin's expecting on a Tuesday afternoon is a visit from Daisy. Ally's kicked him out so she can concentrate on the sculpture she's making for her dad, and he's in his living room practicing some new material that he thinks is almost ready to share with the rest of the band. With his headphones on, it takes a minute for him to hear the knock on the door.

"Does anyone in Ally's family actually call ahead before coming over?" he asks, moving aside to let her through.

"I did," Daisy says, sitting down gingerly on the edge of his couch. "I called Ally first to make sure you weren't there."

Well, that's not ominous at all. "Really?"

She shrugs. "I figured she'd be busy doing something for Dad and Jacinda and wouldn't want you around distracting her."

"So why exactly are you here? Aren't you supposed to be at work?"

"Sisterly concern and I had the afternoon off for an appointment with my OB/GYN. Can you get me a glass of water?"

He obliges her, taking the glass he used for orange juice out of the drying rack and filling it from the tap. He hands it to her and asks, "Is this where you ask me my intentions towards Ally, or where you tell me I need to back off?"

"No, this is where I try to figure out why my sister's been treating my calls like they're Mom's for the last month. And before you tell me to ask her, I have and she just tells me I'm making it up." Daisy takes a sip of her water. "Oh, and every time I ask her how things are going with you, she just says things are fine. Normally when I ask that, I get TMI about your sex life."

He's both tempted to ask about that part and not sure he wants to know. "Well, we still haven't done anal, if that's what you're wondering. Not only have I not asked, I'm not planning on it, and as far as I know, neither is Ally."

Daisy looks like she's going to say something, then shakes her head. "I didn't say I wanted TMI about your sex life."

"Technically, that TMI is about sex we're not having."

"I just want to know if Ally's okay, and if she won't tell me, maybe you will."

Somehow, Colin doesn't think Ally would happy with him if he told Daisy why he thinks Ally's been avoiding her calls. "What makes you think she's not?"

"Well, the fact that I'm having this conversation with you instead of me having it with her, for a start."

"Ally's fine, Daisy. She's just a little overwhelmed with her business and your Dad's wedding." And with acting like nothing's wrong, which he's not sure how to call her on. Or if he even should be calling her on or could without going back to feeling like he's walking on eggshells. 

"That's never stopped her from talking with me before. Normally, she tells me everything."

"Not true. I know for a fact she didn't tell you about Disgusting Donald until after they broke up."

Daisy gives him a smug smile. "That's because she was ashamed of her life choices." Ouch. He walked into that one.

"Ally's fine, we're fine, no one is ashamed of their life choices." He hopes. "Anything more than that, you're going to have to ask Ally."

"I have asked Ally. But, fine. What about you?"

"What about me?" he replies, cautiously.

"Are you okay?"

"I will be if we can stop having this conversation."

"Ha! So there is something going on! I knew it!"

"I did not say that."

"You didn't have to."

"How's the heartburn?"

She crosses her arms over her belly. "Awful, and stop trying to change the subject."

"Tell you what, you stop trying to pry information out of me, and I'll tell Ally to call you when she's done working."

~

"Your sister came by today," he tells Ally when he brings her dinner. "You know, she missed her calling. I can really see her in the interrogation room."

"She gets it from Mom. What'd she want?" Ally says from behind a mouthful of orange chicken. "And why wasn't she at work?"

"Doctor's appointment and to know why you are, and I quote, 'treating my calls like they're Mom's' and to grill me about our relationship. I told her I'd tell you to call her if she left me alone."

She finishes chewing and swallows. "Is that all?"

"I also told her we had no plans for anal, so hopefully, she'll stop asking you about that. What is it you're telling her about our sex life, anyway?"

"Mostly positions, quality, and frequency. She likes to live vicariously. I'm not sure what that says about Eddie." Ally sighs, stabs the chopsticks into her food, and sets down the takeout box. "I'll call her."

"Want me to go back home while you do?"

Ally shakes her head and reaches for her phone. "Nope. I want you to stay."

The call is mercifully brief. It's mostly Ally reading Daisy the riot act. "Stop acting like Mom!" she says into the phone. She's not yelling, but she's pretty loud. "We can handle our relationship by ourselves."

 

~*~

 

"For my dress, I'm picturing nothing too fancy," Jacinda's telling her as she goes through a rack of dresses at the third store they've been to today. "But it should be fun."

"You could wear a Halloween costume," Ally suggests. She's not sure how she got talked into going dress shopping with her dad's fiancée.

"We did talk about that, but we didn't want to have to change before the dinner," Jacinda replies. With a squeal, she pulls out something deep red and short. "Oh, Ally, what about this one?"

"You could certainly pull it off."

Jacinda snaps a picture of it. "I'll text this to Terry to see what he thinks."

~

Four shops later, Jacinda's finally decided on a different red dress that matches the tie that Dad texted her two shops before that trying to match the first red dress. "But we haven't found you anything!" she exclaims when Ally says she's ready to call it a day.

"That's fine!" Her feet hurt from walking and she just wants to go home and collapse on the couch and think about the question of living together before Colin comes back from his sister's."I'll just pick up something between now and the wedding."

"No, Ally, I insist! You've been such a help with everything. It's been so much less stressful than planning my first wedding. Never let your mother plan your wedding."

Ally forces a perky smile. "I'll have to remember that if I ever have one to plan."

"I'm sure you will. Come on, let's find you the perfect dress."

~

Colin's back before she is. He opens the door while she's still trying to figure out how to open it herself without dropping anything. "Hey honey, you're home. And, wow, you did not come back empty-handed."

She's got two dress bags slung over her shoulder, a bag with two boxes of shoes, another bag with half a counter's worth of makeup, and a third bag with the dangly earrings and matching necklace Jacinda insisted she absolutely needed.

"Jacinda really loves shopping," she says, after unloading everything. Colin's on the couch, so she sits down next to him. "How was your sister?"

"In desperate need of a break from her offspring. She left me with them after an hour to go get a pedicure."

She unzips her boots and kicks them off, wiggling her toes before pulling off her socks. "God, a pedicure sounds so good right now. We walked all over Boston. Did you know she also loves walking? And hiking. Oh, and rock climbing, which explains her arms. I don't know how Dad keeps up with her."

"Well, I draw the line at cutting your toenails, but I do give good foot rubs."

"You do. You give amazing foot rubs."

He picks up her right foot and starts kneading the ball with his thumbs. "Next time I go to Katie's, you should come. She wants to meet you."

"You just want help in case you end up in charge of the rug rats."

"It did end up being three against one. But Jacob's still in diapers, so he barely counts."

"Except when he needs changing."

"True. He does have the stink bomb down. Seriously, though, you should come." He does something to the arch of her foot that makes her want to moan and then something else that means she actually does.

"Keep doing what you're doing and I might."

He laughs and stops rubbing, then kisses her instep. "That's not what I mean and you know it. If I didn't know how you react to foot rubs, I'd think you were avoiding giving me an answer."

"Next time you go to your sister's, yes, I'll come with you. Just get back to what you were doing."

This time, he kisses the skin on the inside of her ankle. "I'm holding you to that, even if you do claim I blackmailed you."

~

Ally gets her chance a week later when she wakes up alone in the bed and stumbles out to her living room to find Colin on the phone in just his boxers.

"Sure, Katie," he's saying, a worried furrow between his eyebrows. "I'll come over as soon as I'm dressed. Is there someone who can watch the kids until I get there?"

She goes back to her room and throws on a pair of jeans and a t-shirt. She grabs a shirt, jeans, and socks for him and heads back out to the living room, handing them to him silently. He gives her a grateful look and she goes to put on her shoes and socks.

"What happened?" she asks, pulling on her coat as he hangs up the phone.

"My brother-in-law fell off a ladder while he was checking the gutters. He thinks he broke his ankle, she's worried about a concussion, so they're heading to the ER. I'll just be a couple of hours. You don't have to come if you don't want."

"I do want," she tells him. "Put on your coat. We'll grab coffee on the way."

~

"Did she find someone to watch the kids?" Ally asks once they're on the train to Waltham. She'd stayed up too late working on a sculpture the night before and the coffee doesn't seem to be working. Whenever she tries to sit up, she winds up listing against Colin's shoulder, so she gives up and stays there.

"Their neighbor," he says and eases his arm around her. "Thanks for coming with me."

"Wouldn't want you to be outnumbered in a crisis," she mumbles into his shirt.

~

When they get there, the coffee's finally hit so she's a little closer to awake. His sister lives in a cute Cape Cod with a fresh paint job that's only on the front of the house.

"They've been fixing it up since they bought it," he says, ringing the doorbell. "I guess the gutters are going to be next year's project. After they finish painting."

The neighbor, Ellen, greets them holding a baby. Ally realizes she has no idea how to tell baby ages by size, but this one she'd put at medium large. Ellen gives him a quick status update: the kids are fed, Jacob, who she hands over with obvious relief, had a dry diaper the time she checked, and the other two are in the living room with the television, arguing about what to watch next. Apparently, based on Colin's reaction, that's a regular argument.

"Hey, Jakey," Colin says, tossing him up and earning a fit of giggles. He settles him on his hip. "Let's go find your brother and sister. Justin! Jody!" he calls out and starts walking to what must be the living room. Ally follows.

He looks good with a baby. She doesn't know why that surprises her, but it does. "How old is he?" she asks. "How do you even tell?"

"Eight months. Aren't you, Jacob?" To Ally, he adds, "His crawling is really taking off. He can move forwards now instead of just scooting backwards on his butt."

Justin looks vaguely familiar. He's also wearing an eyepatch. Jody looks kind of like Colin, only with round cheeks and darker hair. She also looks at Ally with an impressive amount of suspicion for someone that small.

"Justin, you remember my friend Ally, don't you? Jody, this is Ally. Be nice."

Justin arrs. Jody just stares at her and frowns.

"Justin's still a pirate," he tells her. "It's lasting a lot longer than his Ninja Turtle period did."

"And what's Jody?"

"The world's youngest teenager," he says, ruffling Jody's hair until she almost smiles. "All right, you two, tell me what you're watching."

"Dora," says Jody, crossing her arms in front of her chest with a scowl. She's even got her feet planted firmly on the ratty carpet.

"I wanna watch _Adventure Time_ ," says Justin. "I don't wanna watch stupid Dora again."

"Dora's not stupid!"

"How about half an hour of Dora then we do half an hour of _Adventure Time_ and then we turn the TV off?"

When they whine about that not being fair, Colin shrugs at them and smiles. "We could turn it off right now. Your choice."

"Why does she always get to go first?" says Justin "It's not fair!"

"You went first last time I was over. It's Jody's turn. Go sit down or I turn it off."

"You're good with kids," she tells him once they've headed to the kitchen to get snacks for the kids and breakfast for them. "I have no idea what to do with them."

"I had a crash course when Katie and Nathan hit a rough spot after Jody was born and now she likes to use me for babysitting. Believe it or not, you get used to it pretty fast."

"I guess I never just really pictured you as the kid type before."

He shrugs and pulls down a box of Frosted Flakes from the top of the cupboard, stretching just enough that his shirt rides up and she can see a hint of skin above the back of his jeans. "I've always been the kid type. It's being the relationship type that took me until you. Can you get the milk and the string cheese? Oh, and the carrot sticks. I think they're in the crisper drawer."

~

Holding the baby is weird, but she's going to have to get used to it after Daisy has hers, so it's good that she's practicing. "Hey, how do I burp him?" she asks. She's been feeding Jacob his bottle while Colin's been keeping the peace with the other two.

"I'll show you. Just always make sure you have a cloth. He's mostly done with it now, but you'd be surprised how much they can spit up in one belch."

~ 

By mid-morning, they've hit the whiny stage where they keep asking how long Mommy and Daddy are going to be gone and, even with the whining, Ally's hit the stage where she's starting to realize that this might really be something she wants some day, not just something she thinks she wants because she's supposed to want it.

And she wants it with Colin. Only with Colin. She can't imagine surviving theoretical parenthood with anyone else. Holy shit. It's probably bad that she's halfway to wanting to drag him to bed and beg him to fuck her bare when she still can't make herself talk to him about living together.

His phone rings and he sets down the Lego he's about to put in the wall they're building as part of a battle scene Justin suggested so he can go answer it. "Yeah?" he says. "That's great. When are they letting you go? Uh-huh, uh-huh. Maybe. Just a sec, let me ask." To Ally, he says, "Are you okay with staying for a while after they get back? No concussion, but he broke his ankle in a couple of places and is apparently ridiculously doped up and may need surgery later. They're still arguing over his x-rays." Katie must say something on the other end because Colin corrects that to, "Sorry, discussing his x-rays. They'll be back after lunch."

Ally still has a few finishing touches left to put on the sculpture she was working on the night before, but she doesn't have to ship it until Wednesday, so she nods. He mouths a thank you and turns his attention back to the phone.

She frowns at the wall and picks up Colin's abandoned Lego. "You're going to have to fortify that section if you don't want the pirates to take over the pumpkin thing."

"It's a pineapple!" Wow, Jody sounds really angry about that.

"Fine, if you don't want the pirates to take over the pineapple."

Lunch is grilled cheese and tomato soup because, as Colin tells her, Jody won't eat anything else and Justin doesn't care what he eats as long as there's cheese in it somewhere.

~ 

Even if she hadn't known it already, it would have been obvious as soon as she saw her that Katie's the older sister. Takes one to know one. "Cols, can you help me extract my idiot husband from the car? He's too heavy for me and I'm going to smother him if he doesn't stop singing Weezer songs under his breath. He doesn't even know half the fucking lyrics." Belatedly, she looks around, probably to see if her kids are within earshot.

"They're back in front of the TV," Ally tells her.

"Oh, thank fuck," she says and exhales. "Sorry, I'm Katie. You must be Ally. And now I need to go pull Nathan out of the car and shove him into bed while Colin's still here to help. "

"I'll keep an eye on the kids," Ally tells her. Thankfully, there's not much eye keeping that needs to be done. Post-grilled cheese, Colin found a movie Justin and Jody both could stand and plopped them in front of it with a bowl of microwave popcorn. Jacob's fast asleep in his playpen.

Ally can't believe she's jealous of a baby, but holy shit, she's tired. She sits down beside Jody and goes back to watching the last few minutes of  _Ice Age_. From the front of the house, she hears the door open, followed by thumping and muffled swearing along with an off-key rendition of "Say It Ain't So". Apparently, Nathan's moved beyond just singing under his breath and is acting like it's karaoke time. Colin starts snickering when Katie tells Nathan to quiet down.

Colin pokes his head into the room to say, "Hey, Justin, Jody, come say hi to your Dad. No climbing on him, though, remember? He broke his leg just like Justin did last summer. Then go outside and play awhile. No more screens."

She'd get up and say hi, too, but the couch has its own gravitational field, so she just waves. Nathan, from what she can tell as Colin helps Katie get him up the stairs, is a little taller than Colin, husky, and apparently a big Weezer fan. She's guessing on the last part. He's moved on to "Perfect Situation".

"Thank god we put a bathroom in on the second floor. I could carry Justin, but no way can I carry Nathan," Katie says after they've come back down. She's collapsed on the other end of the couch, flicking bits of popcorn off the seat. "Oh my god, I know it's early in the day, but need a drink. Do either of you need a drink? Please tell me you need a drink."

"I'll go grab you a beer," Colin says. "Ally, you want one?"

She shakes her head and yawns. "If I have a beer, I think I'll pass out. Is there coffee?"

"Katie can make some. I'm not surprised. You didn't come to bed until four-thirty."

"Jesus, Colin, I called you at eight! You dragged her here instead of letting her stay in bed?"

"I volunteered," Ally tells her, enjoying the view as Colin heads into the kitchen. She yawns again.

Colin comes back with two bottles of beer. He hands one to his sister, sits down, and asks her, "Why was he checking the gutters at eight in the morning on a Sunday?"

"You have met Nathan, right? It's supposed to rain this week and he wanted to make sure they were cleared out because last year, he didn't clear them and we got ice dams and now he's afraid he's damaged the roof permanently."

They keep talking. That's nice. This is nice. God, the couch is comfortable. She probably shouldn't fall asleep on it, though. She's just pretty sure she won't be able to help herself.

 

~*~

 

Ally's eyes keep fluttering shut then flying open while they're talking. Even though it was her idea, she looks so exhausted that he feels a little guilty for dragging her along. Finally, she clearly gives up, pulling her feet up under her and burying her face in his lap, perilously close to his crotch.

"How did she handle the pack of ferals?" Katie asks him once Ally's started to snore softly.

"Well, I'm pretty sure she's never held a baby in her life and Jody insisted on giving her the death glare for not knowing anything about Spongebob, but she did a good job not showing fear. So I'd say overall, she handled them pretty well."

"Is she always this quiet?"

He can't laugh without risking waking up Ally, so he shakes his head until the urge passes before saying, "She's never this quiet. You saw that YouTube toast I forwarded you."

Katie's eyes bug out. "Wait, that's her? You didn't mention that was her."

"Clearly, you weren't paying enough attention to the toast."

"No, because I was too busy paying attention to a baby who was trying his best to chew my nipples off."

He winces. "I was perfectly happy not knowing that."

"There's a reason I switched him to bottles early." Her voice turns big sister serious. "Did the two of you iron things out?"

In his lap, Ally shifts closer until her nose is pressed against the top of his jeans. He looks down at her face, makeup free, a tiny bit of drool visible at the corner of her mouth. "Yes and no. We've agreed not to talk about it for now."

"Colin."

"I'm doing what you told me. I'm waiting it out."

"I meant the fight."

He shrugs. "So did I, because I don't think it's me she's fighting with."

Katie shakes her head and drains the last of her beer. "I hope it works out how you want."

"Thanks, me too."

"Hey, so Mom's coming up the week before Thanksgiving and it's my turn to host. Are you going to be here?"

"Why wouldn't I be?"

She points at Ally. "Let me know soon, okay? I have to figure out headcount before I hit Costco. Do you want to stay for dinner tonight? I have a two-for-one pizza coupon I need to use before it expires."

"I'll have to ask her when she gets up from her nap."

~

Ally agrees to dinner. "It's one less thing for us to do," she says. She blinks a few times and rubs her eyes. "How long was I asleep?"

"Long enough for my legs to fall asleep and the coffee to get cold. I can reheat it in the microwave if you want, but I'll warn you, it's going be gross."

"If it'll wake me up, I'll take it."

"Okay, but remember, I warned you."

"Where's your sister?"

"Trying to convince the kids to stop fighting, as usual. They're out in the backyard. I think there was a disagreement over whose turn it was on the rope swing."

"You guys look a lot alike."

"You should see our toddler pictures. And her senior photo, in case you're curious about what I'd look like in a dress."

"Can't I just see you in a dress instead?"

"Not something I knew you were into, but maybe if you play your cards right."

"I'm not sure it's something I'm into, either," she says, "but I bet you'd be pretty hot."

~

Between dinner and wrangling Justin and Jody and checking in on Nathan, it somehow winds up being eight o'clock before he knows it and they're still at Katie's. Even with the nap and the coffee, Ally's still wiped out. 

"Why don't you just stay the night?" Katie says as Ally starts to doze off again. "There's a guest room in the basement and I have plenty of spare toothbrushes."

He's about to pass on it, but Ally is apparently in favor of anything that means she can go to bed as soon as possible. So in favor of it that she stops trying to stay awake almost as soon as she agrees to it.

~

Colin ends up carrying Ally down the stairs to the basement. Katie and Nathan still haven't done anything to the concrete floor, but at least they've put some throw rugs down since the last time he slept here. They've also painted the wood paneling and replaced the futon with an actual bed and bedside tables.

"Mom said she'd stay in a hotel this year if it was easier for us," Katie explains, pulling back the covers.

He sets Ally down and tucks her in. "That's not passive aggressive of her at all."

"Actually, not really. Want to come sit on the couch and listen to me complain about it?" she asks.

He drops a kiss on Ally's forehead. "Sure."

~ 

"Whiskey or beer?" Katie asks him.

"Beer." She hands him a bottle and pours herself a glass of whiskey. "That looks serious," he says, raising his eyebrows at her.

"Lois is coming. Her daughter's in Hawaii this year."

Lois is Mom's girlfriend. Well, she prefers the term partner. "The kids love Grandma Lois."

"So's Dad."

"And they love Grandpa Shea, who, might I remind you, is perfectly fine with Grandma Lois. Mostly."

"And they're all staying here. All three of them."

Ouch. "Wait, why is Dad staying here? He lives half an hour away."

"It's Jacob's first Thanksgiving and everyone wants to make my life hell. God, I can't wait until you settle down and it's your turn." She winces. "Sorry."

To his surprise, what comes out of his mouth in response is, "Don't be. I'm right there with you."

"Fuck me. You're that serious?"

"I think I'm Grandma Shea's ring serious," he admits, both to Katie and to himself. "I'm just waiting for Ally to catch up. Okay, I'm hoping Ally catches up. Clearly, we're not on the same page right now."

Katie takes his beer and hands him her whiskey and thankfully doesn't ask what he'll do if she doesn't. "Best of luck. I can honestly say never saw this coming."

He takes a drink. "That makes two of us."

~

Ally's taking up most of the bed when he finally goes downstairs. He crawls in the space beside her and turns off the lamp. Then he turns it back on and stares at the acoustic ceiling tiles for a while in shock. Ally throws an arm over him and smacks her lips in her sleep before throwing a leg over him as well and he sighs and turns the lamp back off. The mattress is worse than the futon was. He makes a mental note to tell Katie to get a topper before Mom and Lois come or she's never going to hear the end of it.

~

The first thing she says when she wakes up is, "Ugh. This mattress is awful." The second is, "How did I get downstairs?"

"I carried you," he tells her. He's been up for an hour, thanks to the sound of Justin and Jody running around above them and reminding him why he likes living on the top floor. "There's a toothbrush waiting for you by the sink in the bathroom."

"What time is it?"

"Are you sure you want to know?"

Ally drops her head back to the pillow. "No. You're going to tell me anyway, aren't you?"

"It's a little after seven. Katie's going to run us to the train before she takes the kids to school."

She groans, but rolls out of bed. "If we have kids," she says, "we'll have to get up this early every day, won't we?"

He's going to take that as a good sign. "Only once they're old enough to go to school."

Bleary-eyed, she asks him in what seems to be complete seriousness, "Can we homeschool them?"


	4. Chapter 4

Something's shifted in Ally since Katie's, though Colin's not totally sure what it is or what caused it. It's good, though, so he's not complaining. She seems like she's actually okay, not just pretending to be. Colin's pretty sure that's good. Not sure enough to talk about living together again, but sure enough to think about talking about it.

"What are you thinking about?" she says, startling him, and he realizes he's spent at least the last five minutes staring blankly into space with his arms around a couch cushion.

"Nothing," he replies, and it must sound like it's not because she raises her brows just a little and stares at him.

"I need to go help Jacinda decide on flowers today," Ally tells him. "You know, for a City Hall wedding with four people, this is way more planning than I would have expected."

"Didn't you do that yesterday?"

"No, yesterday turned into shoes again."

"What was wrong with the other shoes?"

"Nothing. These are shoes for after dinner. She claims she doesn't know what to wear to your gig."

"Maybe she just likes to spend time with you."

"She is using the word bonding an awful lot. At least with Daisy's wedding, we got to bond over cake tasting." She slips her feet into her sneakers. "That's the only part of wedding planning I actually enjoy. Maybe my wedding can be all about cake. Screw place settings and assign people a cake table."

The words 'or we could just elope' come perilously close to escaping his mouth. What actually comes out—"You'd look really hot in a wedding dress"—isn't much better.

He braces himself for the kind of response he doesn't want. Instead, she says, "Good point. And Mom owes me big time for that bridesmaid dress."

"You looked pretty hot in that, too," he replies. "Though you looked a lot hotter out of it."

~

"I think she's trying to buy my affection," Ally announces when she gets back. She's got more shopping bags with her. Big ones.

"Is it working?"

"Honestly?" she says. "Kind of. We're doing a spa day the morning of the wedding now."

"Your Dad needs to start upping his game."

"You should take him out. I think you're SOL on the spa day, though."

~ 

Ally's dad's idea of a good time turns out to be record shopping, not shoe shopping.

"There's just something about vinyl," he tells Colin. "You should see my collection sometime. It takes up the whole guest room."

That is incredibly awesome. "Mine's a little smaller," he replies. "But I live in a studio, so I don't have a guest room in which to keep them. And I sold some of the rarer stuff to help pay for my guitar."

"I knew I liked you," Terry beams. "Let's go see what we can find today. Do you have a favorite shop?"

"Actually, I have a couple of them."

"Perfect! Ever look at antique stores? I once bought a whole section of obscure jazz in one when Ava and I were still married and she was looking all over the state for the perfect couch. Ally has it now."

He assumes Terry's talking about the couch. If there was a treasure trove of obscure jazz albums in her apartment, he'd have seen it by now. Probably. The place may be filled with a flea market's worth of weird objects, but records tend to draw his attention.

They're standing in a record store, flipping through some classics of the 1970s when Terry surprises him with a concerned, "How are you and Ally doing?"

Colin pauses with his fingers on a copy of _Diamond Dogs_. "We're fine," he says, cautiously.

Terry pulls out a copy of _No Reason to Cry_ , examining it closely before putting it back. "You make her happy," he says. "It's just hard for her to trust that."

He'd already kind of put that one together. Even if he hadn't, Ally had pretty much told him as much. "Okay."

"She and I are a little too much alike sometimes." He sounds fond and a little wry. "But that's one problem we don't share, even if I do blame myself for not telling her sooner to just be herself. I was just still too busy trying to fit myself into a round hole to tell her that when it would have mattered most."

~

When he gets back, Colin ducks into his apartment first, which is a break from his usual habits. He puts the copy of _Hunky Dory_ he bought to replace the one he lost a few moves ago into the Bowie section and hums a few bars of "Oh! You Pretty Things" and mentally altering the lyrics. _Don't you know that you're driving your boyfriend insane?_ Okay, that's not really fair of him.

Somehow, he has fewer things in his apartment now than he did before they fought about cohabitation. He's down to a single coffee cup and his underwear drawer is basically empty. Even one of the pictures of Katie's kids has vanished from his refrigerator only to reappear on Ally's, and he's not the one who moved it.

At this point, anyone would say they're de facto living together.

Squirreled away in a CD case marked _demos_ is Grandma Shea's engagement ring, which he only inherited because a: he was named after Grandpa Shea; and b: no one else actually wanted it. Actually, he hadn't wanted it, either, considering he thought he'd be the last person to need it, but selling it seemed like something Grandma would have frowned on, so he kept it. He takes it out and stares at it for a while. It's not all that impressive, but if they ever manage to get to that point, he thinks it looks like something Ally would like.

If they don't get to it, he guesses he can give it to Jody someday.

This whole situation is probably cosmic justice for his previous life of casual debauchery.

Ally's going to be wondering where the hell he is, so he puts the ring back in the case, grabs a towel because he used the last clean one at Ally's when he showered that morning, and heads back from his place to go home.

She's at the table when he opens the door, eating a bowl of ice cream and flipping through a magazine. She doesn't look up when she says, "How's dad?"

"The proud owner of about a dozen new albums. What are you reading?"

"One of Daisy's bridal magazines. There's a whole pile on the couch. She forgot to cancel her subscription so now she's decided to just dump them on me. I'm scoping out the competition when it comes to custom cake toppers. Not my favorites, but they do sell well." She shoves a spoonful of ice cream into her mouth. "Why don't any of these dresses have sleeves?"

"Is that chocolate?"

"Chocolate Fudge Brownie. Daisy brought me two pints when she brought over the magazines. Help yourself. Did you figure out what you're going to wear to Dad's wedding? It's in two days."

"Probably the same suit I wear when I have to work. It's already thoroughly wedding-tested."

"Right. Why mess with a classic?" 

~

Because of how he pays the bills, Colin's been to a lot of weddings. He's only been in two before now, three if you count when Aunt Kathleen used him as a ring bearer, which he doesn't because he was four at the time and didn't have any choice in the matter. On the day of the wedding, Ally wakes him up with a kiss that almost makes it all the way to third base before she realizes she has to go meet Jacinda at the spa.

"I got you something to wear," she tells him, handing him a narrow box that she's wrapped in the rest of the Justice League wrapping paper they got when they had to wrap Jody's present. Ally kisses him again. "Gotta go! See you at City Hall!"

He opens it while the coffee's brewing. Tucked inside the box is a tie in a very familiar shade of Pepto-Bismol pink and a note in Ally's handwriting.

_Colin,_

_Found a use for that dress. Can't wait to get you out of what's left of it._

_Love,_

_A._

"I love you, too," he says, laughing.

~

"You wore it!" is the first thing Ally says when she sees him outside the waiting area. She kisses him on the cheek.

"I love it. And you look amazing." She does. Her hair's done up in a half-twist, and she's wearing a periwinkle blue dress that brings out her eyes and does incredible things for her boobs. And her butt.

"What time is your wedding?" one half of the couple next to them asks. "We're at two o'clock."

"It's not ours," Colin says, a little too quickly.

He's startled by Ally squeezing his hand. "It's my dad's. He's in the two-thirty slot."

Jacinda's in red, holding a single red carnation. She looks good, but not as good as Ally. Of course, he's biased. She's next to Terry, her head on his shoulder as they capture the moment on their phones.

"Can you take a picture of us during the ceremony?" Terry asks. "We decided paying for a photographer was overkill."

"I've seen beautiful pictures taken here so we thought about it," says Jacinda. "It's just not what we want."

When their turn comes in room 601, Colin can see why they're the only guests there. It's barely big enough to hold the four of them and the Justice of the Peace. The actual wedding is short and kind of touching. When he looks over at Ally, she's tearing up.

Colin takes the pictures. Most of them come out blurry, but he manages a few good shots. He'll text them to Terry later.

"That was beautiful, Dad," Ally says as the four of them go down the exterior stairs. Colin takes a surreptitious shot of the two of them with his phone. Ally's eyes are huge and damp and he's so in love that it hurts.

"Ally, sweetheart, I'm just so happy you and Colin could share this with us."

"Yeah," Ally replies with a tiny sniffle. "So am I."

~

Dinner is good. The show is better.

"Why the hell are you wearing a goddamn suit?" Richie asks in confusion when he shows up.

"I had a wedding."

"No, you didn't. I would have known. Unless you're cheating on me with another band."

"Ally's dad. He's here tonight. He'll be the goofy older guy with an attractive woman in a red dress beside him. I'll introduce you after the show."

"You're introducing me to your girlfriend's dad." He sounds even more confused. "Okay, I have no idea what she did to the Colin that I've known for nine years, but it's funny as hell."

~ 

Terry and Jacinda end up going to Richie's Halloween bash. Ally and Colin make their excuses and go home.

"I love you," she tells him, pulling off his tie. "God, no one should look this hot in that color."

"Maybe I should leave it on."

Ally shakes her head so hard half of her hairdo comes loose. "I want you naked, buddy. But if you ask me nicely, maybe I'll use it to tie you up." She tosses the tie over the footboard and makes short work of the rest of his clothes.

With a laugh, Colin kisses her. He pulls the remaining pins out of her hair and lets them fall to the floor, unzips her dress and pushes it down to join them. Then he lifts his head and cups her face in his hands and says, "Please?"

~

The day after the wedding, Ally startles him out of a nap with a loud, "Yes! Finally!" She turns from her computer and looks at him. "Eddie's friend Mike wants to talk about buying some of my sculptures for the boutique."

He yawns. "The one you consigned with over the summer?"

"That's the one. People keep asking him about them and now he's thinking about requesting a custom order to go with his own stuff. He wants to meet with me at eight in the morning tomorrow. God, what should I wear?"

"Not a pantsuit, that's for sure." He ducks the pillow she throws at him. "Just wear that grey sweater with black pants and those knee-high boots." He likes those boots.

"No, it's a business meeting. I need to look more professional. I'll call Daisy and ask her. Maybe she's got something I can borrow. Not like she'll be wearing any of it anytime soon."

~

The shock of cold feet burrowing into the space under his thighs wakes him up from a dream that somehow involved Ally and some kind of giant frog lizard thing they were hiding from. Maybe it was about her mom. Or maybe the frog lizards were Ally's hang ups.

"Your feet are freezing," Colin mumbles, opening his eyes just wide enough to see Ally. She's sitting with her back against the footboard, dressed in one of Daisy's suits, the comforter pulled up to her waist. For a second, he thinks he's just switched dreams; then he remembers about the morning meeting.

Ally shoves her feet even further beneath his thighs. "Because it's freezing out and I just walked back from the train in heels."

"Told you that you should have worn the boots."

"And I told you I wanted to look professional."

"The boots look professional. So how'd it go, anyway?"

Her face lights up and he thinks she'd be bouncing if she wasn't busy trying to give him frostbite with her toes. "He's buying them! A dozen of them!"

"You know that means you're buying dinner."

"I don't think I'm going to have time to eat dinner for weeks," she says. "He wants them before Thanksgiving."

Thanksgiving, right. Shit. He rubs his eyes and stifles a yawn. "Hey, speaking of, what are we doing for Thanksgiving?"

"Daisy's at Eddie's parents with Mom in tow, so not that."

"Want to come to Katie's? It's your chance to meet the rest of my family. And I apologize in advance for Sean."

~*~

"I was thinking about getting a hotel room," Colin says. "We can sleep at Katie's, but we'd get the air mattress and the living room floor. Dad's already called the couch. Things tend to go late."

It's the day before Thanksgiving and Ally's spending it baking pies. She weaves another strip of pie crust into the lattice she's working on. She's not sure why everyone seems to think it's so hard. It's a lot easier than sculpting. "Or we could rent a car," she suggests. It would solve the problem of how she's going to transport the pies. "Do you think three pies is enough? I could do chocolate cream as well."

"Three pies is more than enough. It's only fourteen people. Thirteen if you don't count Jacob, which you shouldn't, because Jacob won't be eating pie."

"I'm used to more like three or four. People. Not pies. I made a lot of pies when I was with Donald."

"I was wondering how you got so good at this."

"We both ate our feelings and didn't like leaving the house. And I really like pie." The timer on her phone goes off. "Shit. Go over to your place and see if the pumpkin's done. I don't care that you're not dressed; I'm still working on the apple." The key lime is already cooling. Fine. She's probably gone overboard with the pies.

He comes back a few minutes later, announcing, "Done and now cooling. Hotel or car? We could flip for it. Heads for a hotel room, tails for a car?"

"Sure," Ally says. One last strip and the lattice is done. Finally. She slides it into the oven and resets the timer.

Colin pulls a quarter from the laundry money jar and flips it. "Looks like we're renting a car. Want to go pass some time while the pie's cooking?"

"You're damn right," Ally says. He's been wandering around the apartment in just his boxers all morning. She's only human. It's made it really hard to focus on pie.

"How long have we got?"

"Twenty minutes until I have to turn it down and another forty-five after that."

"In that case," he says, pulling up her shirt, "there's not a moment to lose. You know, we still haven't had sex on your kitchen counters."

"They're covered in flour." Ally tugs him down so she can kiss him.

"Then we'll just have to take a shower after."

"Okay, but be careful with the coffee pot."

"If it breaks, I'll buy you another."

"Yeah, but I don't want glass in my ass."

~

The coffee pot survives. The pie almost doesn't because neither of them is paying a lot of attention when the timer goes off.

"Shit!" she says, finally noticing the beeps coming from her phone.

Luckily, they're close enough to the stove for Colin to reach over and turn it down and then they pick up where they left off.

~

"Not that I'm objecting, but you've been especially physical lately," Colin tells her while they're cleaning themselves up. Water's dripping down his chest from the shower and his hair's sticking up in wet spikes like a hedgehog and she's mentally counting down how long it'll be until he's ready to go again.

"I like sex and we're really good at it and I'm always horny this time of the month," she tells him, grabbing a towel to dry her hair. That's not the whole reason, but it's enough of it. The rest is still sort of a mess in her head.

Not a bad mess, though. And she's pretty sure she's almost done sorting it out. All that's really left is figuring out how to tell him that they want the same thing.

~

It's Justin who opens the door after Colin's third press of the doorbell. Ally's balancing the pie boxes in her arms and wishing she'd put on a warmer jacket. The temperature outside is a shock to the system after she'd cranked the heat all the way up on the drive over.

"Hey, bud," Colin says to his nephew. "Your mom got her hands full?"

Justin, whose mouth looks to be full of orange slices, nods and then just stands there until Katie tells him to move it.

"Sorry," she says, bustling over in an apron and oven gloves. "Nathan's basically useless until he's out of the cast and god knows how long that's going to be right now. I'd hug you, but—" Katie waves her hands.

"Pies on the buffet?" Colin asks, taking the boxes from Ally.

"Pies on the buffet. Mom and Lois are taking a walk with Jacob and Dad and Nathan are trying to teach the kids poker. Our brother, as always, is running late."

"Sounds like fun already," Colin says, setting the pies down.

"Dad loses most of the time and Nathan can never remember the rules. I'm not sure either of them knows enough about poker to be teaching it to anyone."

"I do," Ally says, getting surprised looks from them both. "I've played a lot of poker. Mostly the kind you play with your clothes, but there's a reason I got pretty good at it."

"You never told me you played poker," Colin says. He sounds vaguely wounded.

Ally smiles and, after checking to make sure no kids are around to see it, pats his butt. "You never asked."

"I'm better at poker than I am at basketball," he says, grinning as he drapes his arms around her waist. "I'd probably beat you. Same stakes."

She takes a step closer and looks up at him. "But you can't play a good game of poker with just two people."

"Good point. We'd have to play with Richie and trust me, you do not want to see him with his clothes off."

Katie clears her throat. Ally can feel herself blushing as they jump apart. "No one wants to see anyone with their clothes off right now," Katie tells them. "Jesus, Colin."

"Sorry," he says.

"No, you're not. Go see if Dad and Nathan need anything. Ally, can you come help me in the kitchen after Colin makes the introductions?"

Vague alarm bells start going off in Ally's head at the tone of her voice, but she smiles brightly and says, "Sure."

~

"He's a good kid," Katie says when Ally joins her. She's peeled off her oven mitts and grabbed a knife that could double as a cleaver. Thankfully, she sets the knife down on the cutting board. "Can you hand me the sweet potatoes"

Ally looks around and locates them behind a bag of onions. "All of them?" There are a lot of sweet potatoes lurking back there.

"Sure. At least the kids will eat them. So how was your Dad's wedding? Colin texted me pictures."

"Kind of weird, but sweet."

Katie peels a sweet potato, a slight frown on her face. She chews at her lips the way Colin sometimes does when he's trying to decide if he should say something or not. Eventually, she says, "He's a good kid, but I'm not always sure he that knows what he's doing. And he's never really dated before you."

"He's amazing," Ally says.

"He really loves you." Katie peels another sweet potato and sets it next to the first on the cutting board. "Shit. This is awkward. I'm sorry. It's none of my business."

"He told you about the fight we had, didn't he?"

"He called me in the middle of it." Katie sets the peeler down. "I couldn't fix it."

Ally thinks of every one of Daisy's exes that left her crying to Ally in their bedrooms or over the phone. It's a collection that includes Eddie. "You just want him to be happy," she says. And probably to punch anyone who hurts him. Which, in this case, was Ally. That's okay; Ally's wanted to punch herself a few times, too.

"Yeah. He's my baby brother. And I'm not sure what the hell got into him in his twenties, but he was the sweetest kid."

"I thought he was a total douche when I met him," she admits. "But he's not. He's the best guy I've ever been with. And I've got a lot of them to compare him with." Ally winces a little. "Way too many."

"Do want a glass of wine? I've got an open bottle of chardonnay in the fridge." Katie doesn't wait for an answer, she goes and gets the bottle and pours them each two enormous glasses of it.

Ally takes a long swig. "I want him to be happy, too," she says and takes another drink. "'Cause he makes me happy and I love him. God, I really, really love him."

Katie laughs a little and lifts her glass. "To Colin."

"To Colin," Ally says as they clink their glasses together. "He showed you the toast I made, didn't he?"

"He did. It was something. Can you help me chop the onions for the stuffing? That's normally Nathan's job, but obviously, he's useless this year."

~

By the time Colin's brother Sean shows up with his family, Katie and Ally have most of the food prep completed and most of the bottle of chardonnay emptied. "He always shows up late when it's not his turn," Katie tells her, splitting the last of the bottle between their glasses. "That way, he doesn't have to do anything but eat."

"Smart."

Katie snorts and opens another bottle she's pulled out of somewhere. "Annoying as hell. Next year, I'm turning the tables on him. And I'm also leaving before it's time to do the dishes."

"To letting him do his own dishes." Ally raises her glass.

Katie raises hers in return. "And to turning tables."

There's a nice sort of hazy glow to everything. Ally realizes she's already a little more tipsy than she planned on getting. She stares at the half-full glass in her hand and sighs. "I probably shouldn't drink the rest of this. Pretty sure I don't want to end up on YouTube again."

Katie plucks the glass from her hand and pours the contents into her own glass. "More for me," she says. "Now we just have to wait for the turkey to finish."

~

Ally wanders out into the living room. Nathan's there, as are Sean and Colin's dad, but there's no sign of Colin or any of the kids. "Where's Colin?" she asks.

Sean doesn't look up from his hand. "Upstairs with the rest of the kids' table."

"Sean," his dad says, exasperated. "They're in Justin's room. They got bored with poker."

To be fair to Sean, he does look a lot like one of the kids when she finds them. He's sprawled on his belly, making a Lego pirate walk the plank while Jody uses his back as a footrest. "Hey Ally," he says. "Connor, Kevin, this is Ally."

"Thought you'd be playing poker," she says, sitting down in the emptiest spot of carpet she can find. The room looks like an explosion happened at a toy factory.

"We were, but the lure of the Lego was too much, right guys?"

"Dad told us to go find something else to do if we didn't want to follow the rules," says either Connor or Kevin. It's whichever one of the two Colin told her is the oldest. She thinks that means it's Kevin. She hadn't been paying too much attention when they came in.

"We may or may not have been making towers with the chips," Colin tells her.

~

Ally decides she likes Katie better than she likes Sean about halfway through dinner. She doesn't exactly dislike Sean. She just thinks he's a bit of a dick. That's okay. Colin seems to agree with her.

"So how'd you meet Colin, Ally?" Sean asks, ladling gravy over his mashed potatoes.

"He lived across the hall from me. Can you pass the cranberries?"

"You didn't tell me you moved, Colin," Sean says. Belatedly, Ally realizes she'd used the past tense.

Colin freezes for a second, fork hovering above his plate. "I haven't," he replies. He sets down his utensils and takes a big sip of wine. "Yet." 

"Not officially," Ally adds. It's not how she meant to broach the subject. If this goes badly, she's blaming the wine. "He still needs to give notice and get the rest of his stuff moved in." 

Katie's watching them both very closely. "Congratulations," she says. "I think a toast is in order."

~

In the break between dinner and dessert, Colin asks her to go for a walk. He waits until they're a block away from the house to ask, "Did you mean it, or was that all the wine you and Katie had in the kitchen talking?"

She's had more wine since then. So has he. Renting a car is starting to look like it wasn't the best option. Ally leans her head up against him and nods against his jacket. "I was going to ask you after Thanksgiving. What I was going to say is, I don't ever want to live without you and if I don't live with you, that's what would happen eventually. Sorry to just spring it on you at the dinner table."

"I've had worse surprises." He kisses her nose. "It's freezing out here," he says. "Want to go back?"

"God yes. Is there a closet or something where we can hide and make out until everyone's ready for dessert?"

"No, but there is a garage and I think there's a space heater in it, that is if you don't mind making out next to a ladder and a pile of paint cans."

"That'll do," she says. "As long as the space heater's working."

"If it's not, we can lock ourselves in a bathroom. You know there's no way I'm going to be able to us drive home, right?"

"Guess we're stuck here, then."

"We might still be able to get a hotel room. There's probably somewhere that still has a vacancy."

"I'm okay with the floor. You and me, curled up in a sleeping bag."

"My dad, snoring on the couch beside us."

"We could sleep in the garage."

"We're not sleeping in the garage. But we should go see if the space heater's working."

~

The space heater's working, warming up the usual garage scent of paint thinner, motor oil, and stale dusty air. Ally winds up pushed up against the garage door, Colin's hands pushed up under her sweater and his thigh pushed between her legs. Sleeping in the garage might not be that bad, she thinks.

"We should stop," he says, breathing heavily. "Dessert's probably waiting."

"You're right, we should. It probably is."

They don't, but at least they're still technically dressed when Katie comes looking for them.

"Jesus, Colin!" Katie yelps from the door that leads into the basement before immediately slamming it shut again.

"We really should have locked that," he says, giggling into her hair. She can feel him fumbling around her back as he tries to do up her bra. At least it's easier for her. All she has to do is zip up his jeans.

"We're decent," he calls out when they've managed to adjust their clothing.

Katie opens the door again and peers around cautiously. "You're so far from decent it's ridiculous."

He's still giggling. "Fine, our clothing is all back where it should be."

Katie shakes her head. "If you want dessert, get upstairs. We're about to start serving."

"I should probably feel bad about this," Ally says as they head up. "But mostly I feel like you might be right about getting a room."

"I'm pretty sure Katie would agree. Why don't we see if we can't find a place with a vacancy?"

~*~

"Last chance to back out before I give our landlord notice tomorrow," Colin says. He's sitting on his floor, taping together another moving box to hand to Ally. They started the day after Thanksgiving and, three days into it, have pretty much failed to pack much of anything.

She sets it next to the three he's already assembled. "Too late. I've already talked to him about putting you on the lease."

"He'll be happy to jack up the rent on this place. Pass me the other Sharpie, will you?"

She throws him the green one and uncaps the red. "What's going in this one?"

"That one is for the bathroom."

Ally scrawls _bathroom crap_ on it and asks, "Do you even have anything left in the bathroom?"

"Honestly? Not a lot." And most of it is stuff he's planning on throwing out anyway. He likes Ally's body wash a lot better than he likes any of what he's got stashed away in the basket under the sink. Probably because her body wash smells like Ally and his smells like showering at the gym. "But whatever's in there, pack it up anyway. We can sort it out later."

"Or we could sort it out now and not have to carry so many boxes across the hall," she says.

She has a point. "Okay, I'll pack it up and sort it if you pack the kitchen. There's a lot less to sort in the kitchen."

"Deal. What are we going to do with your furniture?"

"Probably sell most of it on Craigslist."

"Can we keep your mattress and sell mine with your bed?"

He grabs the box marked for the bathroom and gives her a quick kiss. "That works for me."

"We'll keep your pillows, too," she calls after him. "We can always use extras!"

~

"Is it weird that it feels different waking up here now?" he asks at the end of their first official week of cohabitation.

Ally rubs at her face and takes the cup of coffee he's brought to the bedroom for her. "Different how?"

"I don't know. Just different."

She frowns, looking a little worried. There are sheet marks on her right cheek and her hair is clinging to her forehead. "Is that good or bad?"

"Good. Definitely good."

"We should probably haul more boxes over here today," she says.

"We've got to the end of December. That's plenty of time."

She gulps her coffee. "Yeah, plenty of time except for holiday orders for me, holiday parties for you, Daisy having a baby, and the actual holidays."

"You're right. We should move more boxes." Crap, he has a holiday party to play at tonight. And tomorrow night. "And I need to make sure my suit's ready."

"Already done. I picked it up from the dry cleaner yesterday and it's clean, pressed, and hanging in the closet. Oh, hey! While we still have them, can I use your counters to dry my holiday orders?"

"You picked up my dry cleaning, so I think you can use whatever you want."

Ally smiles and sets the cup down on the dresser. Then she kisses him and says, "I'm going to hold you to that."

~ 

The only reason Colin's not working when Daisy goes into labor is that the 16th is Richie's wife's birthday and he refuses to take any jobs that conflict with that, using the logic that having a birthday during the holidays is already miserable enough. He is working, well, about an hour into recovering from working, when she actually gives birth on early on the morning of the 18th because, as he reminds Ally a few times, first babies tend to take longer.

"It's two-thirty in the morning," he hears Ally saying into her phone. "Yeah, Mom, I know I said to call me as soon as the baby's born." There's a long pause. "Wow. Holy crap. That's huge. Tell them congratulations and we'll see them tomorrow during visiting hours."

"Boy or girl?" he mutters into his pillow.

"Boy. You owe me twenty-five bucks."

"Name?"

"Noah Edward Vogel. He's nine pounds, ten ounces and twenty inches long. Mom says he's perfect."

"Spoken like a true grandparent."

~

Noah's bald, fat, and wrinkled with a misshapen head that's red from screaming, so pretty much your typical newborn. A little cuter than Kevin was, not quite as cute as Jacob, but Jacob was a c-section baby, which is kind of cheating. More importantly, Ally looks adorably awkward trying to figure out how to hold him.

"Do they all smell this good?" she asks, sniffing his head.

"In my experience," Colin answers, taking the baby because it's finally his turn to hold him, "yes."

~

"So Christmas," Ally says when they get home from visiting Daisy and child. "We should probably figure that out."

"Katie and Nathan are going to be in Vermont with his parents, Mom and Lois are staying in Florida with Lois's daughter, and Dad's at Sean's."

"So no objections to spending Christmas morning at Daisy and Eddie's?" she asks, looking relieved.

"You're the one with the brand-new nephew, not me."

"I should probably put the tree up."

"You have a tree?"

Ally goes into the bedroom and pulls out a tattered cardboard box that looks like it's at least a few decades older than they are. "I have a tree," she says, proudly. "I rescued it from the attic when I went off to college."

Then she sets it up on the coffee table in front of the sofa in all its 1960s aluminum glory. "Don't have many ornaments," she says, "But I do have a tree."

"We could hang candy canes on it," he suggests. "They're on sale right now and we wouldn't have to put them away. We could just eat them when we're done."

~ 

Ally spends the four days leading up to Christmas painstakingly working on the sculpture she's making for Daisy, Eddie, and Noah and the almost-identical one she's making for Ava. Colin spends them moving more boxes from his apartment and wondering if he's ever going to get his cleaning deposit back.

He found the perfect thing for Ally by accident when he was shopping for Katie, so that's taken care of. He still hasn't found anything for Katie, but as he's not going to see her until after New Year's, he's not all that worried about it. He'd be worried about Ally's family, but she's already told him she's adding his name to their cards. All he has to do is wrap the gifts.

"You know that Christmas with a newborn in the house is going to be like a visit to hell, right?" he tells Ally, well, warns Ally. He adjusts the bow on the box containing Ava's sculpture. Ally's gift from him is under their tree, whatever she has for him next to it.

"Sounds festive," she says.

"If by festive you mean a mess of angry crying and not always coming from the baby. Forewarned is, as they say, forearmed. Be prepared to be helpful and duck if there are any explosions."

"Have you been through it before?"

"Christmas? No. Easter? Yes, when Justin was a week and a half old, and it was brutal. Thankfully, everyone else had the good sense to be born far away from a holiday. We could be lucky, Noah could be an easy baby."

~

Noah is not an easy baby. Noah is, in fact, kind of the opposite of an easy baby. Both Daisy and Eddie look like extras in a zombie movie. Daisy especially. As they take off their coats, Colin looks over at Ally and winces, mouthing, "Not good."

She winces back and he shrugs.

"Hi, Daisy," she greets her sister. "You look amazing."

Daisy, screaming infant tucked up against her shoulder while she attempts to burp him, gives her a flat glare. "I look like a whale who's been run over by a truck."

"Oh, Daisy," says Ava. "Listen to Ally. You look beautiful. Here, let me take Noah so you can relax."

"I can't relax! He won't let me relax."

"Nonsense. Of course he will."

"No, Mom, he won't." Daisy narrows her eyes. "Just let me hold him. He's got to go to sleep soon. Or spit up. Or burp. Whatever it is he wants. All I know is that's not food because he nursed five minutes ago."

Colin sets the presents under the tree, which is pristine enough that either Daisy decorated while she was nesting or Ava was responsible for it, and resigns himself to the fact that it's going to be a long morning.

"There's coffee," Ava informs them. "Let me get you each a cup. Colin, you take cream and sugar, don't you?"

"I do," he lies. He only takes sugar, but he's not about to rock the boat right now.

They do get a respite when Noah finally spits up and then promptly falls asleep for long enough to everyone to open their gifts.

"Ally, this is beautiful," Daisy says, looking the sculpture of Daisy, Eddie, and Noah that Eddie opened for them both. She turns to Ally, blinking back tears. "Thank you."

Ava's is similar, but instead of Eddie there holding the baby in it, it's her, the patrician lines of her face softened with a tiny, satisfied smile. Ally's outdone herself with them.

"I didn't know what you'd like," Ava tells him, handing him a small package wrapped in gold and cream paper that matches the ornaments. The tree, Colin decides, was definitely Ava's doing.

He opens it carefully while Ava watches him like a hawk. Honestly, he's expecting socks. Instead, it's a framed photo of Ally in her teens. She's on a beach and, he sees, has bangs falling into her eyes. "Thank you," he tells her.

To Ally, she says, "I put away the one of you and Jake."

Ally gets a gift certificate to what's apparently Ava's salon. "Still going to Nigel, Mom," she says.

Ava sighs and tells her, "They also do massage."

Not surprisingly, Daisy and Eddie have resorted to giving everyone gift cards.

~

As they're finishing breakfast, Noah wakes up with a wail that wouldn't be out of place on a police car. Colin regrets within seconds that he didn't bring earplugs.

"You really should let me take him," says Ava. "I raised two of you, after all."

"Mom, stop fussing!" Daisy snaps. She's struggling, trying to open her nursing shirt while holding the baby. "I know what I'm doing and right now, that's feeding him, which I know I need to do because my boobs hurt and are leaking through my nursing pads and please, just leave me alone and find something else to worry about!"

Ava raises her chin, her mouth thinning slightly. There's the faintest hint of a wobble in her voice that he's not sure anyone else notices as she says, "I'm only trying to help. I'll clear the table." Then she stands up, shoulders stiff, and starts gathering up the dishes.

He stands and tells her, "I'll come help." Ally can take care of Daisy. He'll bite the bullet and handle her mom.

~

In the kitchen, Ava stands at the edge of the sink. "Colin," she says, pulling a pair of blue dish gloves from the drawer beside it, "can you pass me one of the plates? They need to be rinsed before going into the dishwasher. It does a horrible job unless you do."

He hands her one, which she sprays off and woodenly puts in the dishwasher. Then she puts her hands on the granite countertop, her shoulders finally sagging. "I just want to help her," she says. The wobble is back, and this time it's obvious.

"I know," he tells her. "The first few weeks are the roughest."

There's a tiny sniffle with a bit of a laugh. "I remember. My mother never helped me with either of the girls." She's crying. He's not sure he thought that was possible. "I only want what's best for her."

"Let her ask you," he suggests. "She knows you'll help if she really needs it."

"You're not what I wanted or pictured for Ally"—she wipes her eyes with the corner of her blouse—"but I suppose I never did quite understand what she wanted for herself. Thank you," she says.

He passes her another plate, not quite sure where she's going with that. "For what?"

"For being what she needed. It's good to see her happy. That's all a mother really wants, after all." She gives him a tremulous smile and he can see a lot of more of his Ally in her now than he ever has before.

"Thank you," he replies.

"Now," she says, shoulders going back to their normal position. "Let's finish up these dishes."

~

In the end, it's not as bad as he expected, but he's really glad when it's time to go home.

~

"Remind me not to have kids in December," Ally says, grabbing a candy cane from the tree and flopping down on the couch.

"Want to open your gift now?"

"Mmm. Sure. I should have hung mistletoe."

"We can pretend we did later." He hands her the package containing a shadow box that carefully displays a selection of miniature porcelain dolls in various states of disrepair. "They kind of reminded me of your sculptures. And"—he points—"they'll fit on that blank spot on the wall."

Her face scrunches up in a grin. "I love it," she tells him. "Open yours."

It's another sculpture, but this one he's pretty sure they should keep in the bedroom. It's of them kissing, her legs wrapped around his waist, and instead of being sculpted and painted, Ally's dress is made from some very familiar scraps of pink bridal satin and tulle. He laughs and says, "Oh, Ally."

"I had plenty left over after the tie," she explains. "And I realized I don't actually want to learn how to quilt."

~

On New Year's Eve, Colin's things are still mostly in boxes because they still haven't figured out where they're going to put any of it. About the only thing that he's really unpacked is his record collection and that wasn't so much a case of unpacking as carefully moving them over one by one until they were where they belonged. Almost everything else he needs has been over here for a while.

"So, hey, about Richie's party," he says, trying to figure out if there's room for a bookshelf in the space he's been staring at for the last five minutes. Ally has a lot of stuff.

Ally has a paintbrush in her mouth. Around it, she replies, "What about Richie's party?"

"Do you have your heart set on going to it?"

She sets the brush down. "I bought a dress for it."

"That's not really about the party."

"No, but I do have my heart set on wearing the dress."

"Does it have to be at the party?"

"Not if you don't want it to be."

"Good, because I've got a few ideas for how we can spend tonight. I think you might even like them more than the party." He hopes. "Do you think if we move a few things around, we could fit a bookshelf over there?"

Ally comes up behind him and drapes her arms around his shoulders. "Where would we put everything else?"

"Some of it, we'd put on the bookshelf."

~

He goes out and buys a bottle of champagne and some snacks for their night in while she gets dressed. "I see why you wanted to wear the dress," he says when he opens the door. It's black and gold and sparkly as hell. It's also amazingly short and clings to everything. "You look incredible in it, which means I really want to get you out of it."

"It doesn't have a zipper," she tells him. "You'll be able to just pull it off."

"What's underneath it?" he asks.

She grins and comes over to put her arms around him. "You'll just have to find out."

"Oh yeah?"

"Yeah."

"Just let me put this bag down first."

~

"So what were your ideas for the night?" Ally asks him. Her dress is hanging from the post of her footboard and she's leaning back against the pillows, sipping from the glass of champagne he brought in. 

Colin sets the plate of food he's carrying down on the glass table, next to the champagne bottle and his glass. "Mostly this," he admits. "We've been so busy that I just didn't want to spend today with anyone who wasn't, well, you."

"That is a good idea," she says. "I like that idea a lot."

"I also got some movies we haven't had time to watch and, if we feel like putting clothes on, I thought we could go up to the roof for a while. We could do it without clothes, but it's both cold and windy out."

"Yes to the movies, no to the roof."

"Don't feel like getting dressed?"

"Not if I don't have to."

~

"An hour left until the new year dawns." Colin runs a hand up her bare leg. They've managed two movies, a bottle of champagne, and a lot of sex, both on the bed and on the couch. He should be getting up to open a second bottle to toast the new year, but he keeps getting distracted. "What are your hopes and dreams?"

"You mean my resolutions?"

He kisses the side of her neck, enjoying the way she shivers. "Those too. What do you want?"

She tilts her head up and brushes her lips across his. "Just you. Okay, and enough sales to never have to go back to working in marketing, but mostly you."

"You already have me."

"Good, 'cause I'm not giving you up. Ever. For the rest of my life. What about you? What do you want?"

The same thing she's saying she does, he's just not sure if she wants it in the same way yet. Colin hesitates for a moment, wondering if he really wants to do this now, before saying, "If I ask you something, do you promise to not change your mind about that? It's not something you have to answer right now. Honestly, it's probably something I shouldn't be asking yet, but I've had just enough champagne that I'm going to ask anyway."

She smirks and wiggles against him. He didn't think he'd be ready to go again until next year, but he has to admit it's a good kind of distracting and he's probably almost halfway there. "Can't say it's my favorite, but the backdoor's open if you want it."

"As flattering as that is, and no matter how much it would make Daisy's head spin when you overshared later, that's not what I'm going to ask. Hang on, I need to get something."

Because he's got digital copies of everything, the CDs are one of the things still in a box. Actually, in multiple boxes. In hindsight, he probably should have labelled everything more clearly. He finds what he's looking for in the box with  _kitchen crap etc._  scrawled on it Ally's handwriting in red Sharpie.

"Here," he says, crouching down next to the couch and handing her the case.

"You wrote me a song?" she asks, lips curling into a curious grin.

"I write you lots of songs." Inhale, exhale. He hopes this wasn't a bad idea. "Open it." She does. She doesn't say anything, she just stares at it without blinking. He swallows. "It was my grandmother's. Remember, you don't have to answer yet."

"Can't answer what you haven't asked." She's smiling and she doesn't look upset. That's good. Actually, she looks happy. That's better. And she's playing with the ring, which is probably the best sign of all. It's a little big when she tries it on her ring finger. He watches her slip in on her middle finger instead. Then she looks at him expectantly. "Come on, Colin. Out with it. Time's a-wasting if you plan on asking before next year."

Maybe it's relief, maybe it's just Ally, maybe it's the ridiculousness of everything, but he bursts out laughing, then he's laughing so hard he can hardly breathe. He buries his face in her belly until he catches his breath. When he looks up again, she's grinning and her eyes are a little wet.

"Ally Darling"—he starts laughing again and has to start all over—"Ally Darling, will you marry me?"

And she's laughing, too, tugging him up until they're sprawled chest-to-chest. "Yes," she tells him finally. "The answer is yes."


	5. Epilogue

"Mom claims it's bad luck for the groom to see the bride before the wedding," Ally calls out. She's standing in front of the bathroom mirror, putting on a final layer of waterproof mascara. "But I need you to do up my dress."

Colin comes in from the bedroom. His's shirt back on finally, just not all the way buttoned up, and his hair's still a little damp from the shower they had to take after the first time they started getting dressed and as much as she'd like to get him naked again, ASAP, if she does that, they'll miss their own wedding.

"Good thing we don't listen to your mother," he says and starts doing up the buttons on the back of the dress. There are an awful lot of them and he's teasing the skin on her back as he's buttoning them. A zipper would have been faster, but this is a lot more enjoyable. He does up the last one and drops a kiss on the back of her neck. It's a serious point in favor of her decision to wear her hair up. "You look so beautiful."

Ally fiddles with the neckline and adjusts the bodice. She smiles and says, "You always say that." Not that she ever gets tired of hearing him saying it, 'cause he always sounds like he means it.

"Because it's always true." He kisses the back of her neck again and yep, she definitely made the right choice with the hair. "But especially today. I like the dress. You look like Grace Kelly in it."

"Thanks. I couldn't find one with sleeves so I had to go vintage. All the bridal shops seem to be boycotting them and I didn't want to wear a bolero." She may not look like Grace Kelly, no matter what Colin seems to think, but she'll agree that dress looks great. It's just kind of a tight squeeze, even with the bustier that's sucking everything in. At least it's a tight squeeze with sleeves. "But it's a little hard to breathe in this thing."

And there go his hands, spreading out over her hips. "You're the one who decided we needed to get married on leap day. You could have suggested we wait until summer and then you wouldn't have needed the sleeves."

"And you're the one who agreed and said it was an awesome decision, so go finish getting dressed," she says, half-heartedly pushing his hands away. "If we miss this date, we can't get it again for four years and that's four years for Mom to try to get me to agree to a big wedding."

They decided it almost as soon as they got engaged that should be just the two of them, no big ceremony, no months of planning, no need for Ally pick out place cards and pretend to care about minuscule differences in fonts. Ally's letting Mom throw a reception after the ceremony, but she also made Mom promise on pain of death that it'll be a small one with family only, and that Ally's involvement in the planning could begin and end with choosing the cake. She's made Daisy swear, also on pain of death, to keep Mom from going overboard, but if Mom gets anything more than the two months' notice they gave her, all bets are off.

"Well, I don't want to wait four years, and I don't want a big wedding, but I will point out that we do still have at least an hour until the cab gets here."

"Yeah, well I've finally got my dress on, buddy, so too late. I'm not taking this thing off again until we're married."

He meets her eyes in the mirror. "I never said you had to take the dress off."

"It's tight enough that I'm worried we'd rip it."

"In that case, I guess we'll just have to get creative." Colin turns her around so she's facing him, hands back on her hips, slowly making their way to her butt while he kisses her and damn it, he's not playing fair. She's nearly unbuttoned his shirt the rest of the way before she comes to her senses and takes a reluctant step back.

"You can get creative after the wedding," she says. "Even if it wouldn't screw up the dress, we don't have time to shower again. Clothes on, now."

Colin grins and kisses her again. "Okay, but I'm holding you to it."

"My bedroom at Mom's has a lock on the door," she says. "I'm planning on taking advantage of that when we get there. And taking advantage of you." Ally pushes him out of the room and goes to fix her lipstick. And, damn it, fix her hair. Maybe wearing it up wasn't the best plan. She grabs her curling iron and tries to make the bits that escaped look like she meant for them to do that.

~

The vows she's written down aren't much different than her first big declaration of love at a stranger's wedding. She's still happiest when she's being herself and she's still herself when she's with him. All she's really adding is some stuff about promising to trust herself to be herself. Ally checks them again, folds the paper, and slips it back into her clutch. Ten minutes until the cab's here. She fiddles with her ring, still on her middle finger because she likes the way it looks there, and tries to figure out if there's anything she's missing.

Not really.

"You have the rings?" she asks. He's the one with the pockets and she doesn't feel like trying to put anything else in the clutch. It's cute, but it barely fits her vows, lipstick, and ID. She still doesn't know what she's going to do about her phone.

"I have the rings."

"You have our keys?" Ally straightens the pink tie.

"And our keys."

"Do you have any room left in your pockets for my phone?"

"You could just carry a bigger purse. Or wear a coat with pockets"

"Yeah, but the purse matches the dress and this is the only coat I could find that doesn't clash with it."

"It still doesn't hold anything." But he motions for her to give it to him anyway. "Ready?" he says, slipping it into the inside pocket of his jacket.

Ally takes as deep a breath as the dress will allow. "Ready."

~

The Justice of the Peace's office where they're getting married is even smaller than the room the use at City Hall, but it's big enough for the two of them.

This is actually happening. Her hand shakes a little as they take care of the paperwork.

Colin takes his ring out of his pocket and slips it over her thumb. "You first."

Ally swallows, breathes, and takes his hands. "I love you, and I love who I am when I'm with you, because when I'm with you, I can be me." She slides the ring off her thumb and onto his finger. "And I promise to listen to my heart, not my neurosis, and to remember always all you've ever asked is for me to just be me. You're who I love, who I want, and who I need."

"And I love you," Colin says. The ring catches on her knuckle for just a second before he gets it on. "I promise to love you and support you and to never let you think you need to change for me. You make me laugh and somehow, you always manage to surprise me. You're everything I never thought I wanted and you're everything I need."

And then, by the power vested in their Justice of the Peace by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, they're married. Now they just have to make it through the reception. Which is going to be the first time their families have met. Maybe they should have agreed to an engagement party. Or skipped a reception.

~

"If we go in through the back," she says as they get out of the cab, "we might be able to make it up to my room before anyone sees us."

"But if we go in through the front, we'll be able to spend more time up there and claim that we're changing."

"Yeah, well, we will be changing. I'm not eating dinner in this." She wrinkles her nose and starts heading for the door. "I can't eat dinner in this. I don't think I could even eat a breath mint."

"Can you manage champagne?"

"I can always manage champagne."

"Good, because that looks like your mom greeting us at the door with two glasses of it."

"Oh, Ally," Mom says as Colin helps Ally out of her coat. "You look lovely." For once, she even refrains from saying anything bad about her hair. "And Colin," she adds, "let me introduce you to Ally's cousins."

Ally grabs her champagne flute and drains it. She's going to kill her. Or Daisy. Even if cousins are family, technically. Including step-cousins.

~

"So that's Beau," Colin says when they've managed to escape to her room. He's laughing, damn him.

Ally sits down on the edge of her bed. "Yep, that's Beau."

"There are a lot of people down there."

"Yeah, well, Mom seems to have gone with the extended definition of family."

"The more people there are, the less likely we are to be missed." He kneels at her feet and slips off her shoes, then pushes up the lace and tulle of her skirt and kisses the inside of her knee. "Ready to get creative?" he says.

Holy shit, whatever he's doing with his hands under that skirt feels incredible. She gathers the skirt up and leans back and says, "Oh, hell yes."


End file.
